Bringing Back the Past
by Shinan7
Summary: Naruto- a yaoi fan fiction writer with a love for online friends. His high school life is getting better but what happens when his past comes back to haunt him? Two dangers: One he remembers with every nightmare, in vivid detail. The other is a face on paper, and the same last name. Yaoi! School AU! Gaara/Naruto
1. Chapter 1

**Disclaimer: Naruto does not belong to me in any way, shape, or form.**

**Note: This fanfiction is a YAOI. You have been warned.**

**Warnings: **

**AU(School fic)**

**Maybe OOC**

**Yaoi/Male love/Slash**

**Violence**

**Rape(probably won't be graphic but will be implied)**

**Rating: T+(Will change later on)**

**Pairings: Gaara/Naruto, ?/Naruto, ?/Naruto**

**Please no flames, I already warned about what this story would and would not have. If you don't like any of the above, then you don't have to read.**

* * *

_"I will miss you Naru-chan. Remember what I've told you..." Those last few words were whispered threateningly into Naruto's ear. The threat went unnoticed by anyone besides the young boy because it was disguised as a good-bye hug. It was also unfortunate that the other three adults were speaking to each other instead of watching the interaction between the pale man and the young boy._

_Fear, it was constant in Naruto as soon as the man had showed his true colors, and those words only made it worse. Naruto felt his body begin to shake uncontrollably, and the tears were running freely down his face as the hand wrapped around him tightened on his hip. The force would be enough to leave a bruise. That one would fade quickly, leaving being unblemished skin. That was one of many things the man had discovered about Naruto._

_And Naruto knew that he wouldn't breathe a word about it to threat was all too real, even more so to a child like Naruto._

_"I hope you find the horrible man that did this to Naru-chan's face." The social worker sated with a grim face to the police officer that she was talking to. _

_"We're doing everything in our power to find him. It hurts the investigation that Naruto can't remember the face or where he was taken to._

_"I don't think you should be talking about that right in front of Naru-chan, you're making him cry." The pale man still holding Naruto spoke over his shoulder but his gaze stayed trained on the little face that was turned away from him, eyes downcast and tears streaming freely. "Do you know where his next foster home will be? I'd like to keep in touch with Naru-chan." The small body in his arms tensed, and his eyes flickered over to meet the gold eyes staring hungrily at him. _

_"I'm sorry, I'm not free to disclose that type of information." The social worker replied. Her response made a look of rage pass on the pale man's face but it was gone in less then a second, no one except Naruto noticed it. _

_The shaking increased. _

_"That's too bad. I'll make sure to tell Sasu-chan and Ita-chan that you said good-bye, all right Naru-chan?"_

_The tear stained face froze for a second, eyes widening in horror. Then, with a shaky breath, his blue eyes closed, body slumped in defeat, and he nodded, not in agreement to the words but at the threat that laid underneath them. The man wouldn't have mentioned Naruto's friends other wise._

_"Come, we have to go Naruto..." The social worker walked closer, making the pale man let go of Naruto, and stepping back so she could lead him away._

With a gasp, Naruto sat up in his bed, heart beating erratically and his breathing more then a little bit harsh.

A dream. Just a dream.

Well.

Not really a dream. Most of it was the truth.

But that was the past. It was long gone, never to bother him again.

Naruto could forget those words, could forget the pain, the anguish he felt every time they entered his mind. He hadn't seen or heard of any one of them since he'd been pulled to a new place, he'd been scared at first but over the years the fear had faded away.

Finally, he wouldn't have to worry about that man. He was beyond hurting him now. Years of not even a glimpse of him and finally, he could forget. Forget it all and move on. He was no longer a scared, defenceless child.

Finally.

Naruto wasn't ever going to be alone again.

After years of being forced to move from place to place. From family to family. Year after year of being forced to leave the few good friends behind, to leave _him _behind, it was finally over.

Finally, no danger, no pain, no fear.

He was finally done with it. He finally had the one thing that he's always wanted for years, ever since he could remember.

A family.

No longer would he be kicked from house to house.

From miserable, hopeless and terrifying situations because...

Finally, someone had _seen_ something in him and wanted him.

Adopted him.

And now he wasn't alone.

Finally.

**Chapter One: 3 Months Later:**

The world ended.

"No..."

At least for Naruto it did.

"No..." The whimper escaped from his lips, not believing what had just happened.

"Aughhhhhhhhh!" Naruto frantically pulled at his hair in despair... Staring at the blank screen that was right in front on him.

He'd almost had it...

The last of his notes...

The last of his settings...

Documents...

Original plot lines...

Dozens of chapters written...

Older works that had just been there...

Waiting for him to start them back up again...

Fan fictions...

Gone...

All gone!

"Damn it all! Why the hell couldn't you have lasted just a little long? Why?!" Naruto frantically moved the power cord around, trying to get that little yellow light to flash on...to get the other blue light to stay on to show that the charger was connected. The yellow light would mean that the battery was charging... That the old friend he'd had for years still had a little life in him...

Just a little... Please.

Black.

Not even a blink.

No flash.

Nothing.

"Fuuuccccckkkkkkk!" Naruto screamed again, face twisting in frustration.

"Naruto! Stop screaming! And watch that language!" A voice outside his door shouted.

"No! It's dead! Dead! DEAD!" Naruto shouted back, slamming his forehead on the desk, narrowly missing the black keyboard of the laptop. "Whyyyyy?"

"Naruto! Quiet down! Some people have work to do!" The female voice shouted again.

"No! No! No! Nooooooooooooooooooooo!"

The stomping once again sounded outside the room, but this time, it didn't halt behind the door, it continued until they stopped next to Naruto who was still well on his way of giving himself a concussion.

"Naruto, would you quit it?! You're only going to end up hurting yourself. What the hecks the matter anyways?" Tsunade asked, debating whether to grab a hold of the blonde's hair to stop him. She really didn't want him to get any head damage, and the way he was banging his head, she wouldn't be too surprised if he really did end up giving himself a concussion.

"It diedddddd!" Naruto moaned, momentarily halting his head to desk movement as he glared heatedly at the old laptop in front of him.

"What died?" Tsunade raised an eyebrow, completely confused.

"My best friend... Tommy-chan! Please come bacccckkkkkk!" Naruto pointed to the ancient thing before trying to push the power button again. It was in vain, the screen stayed blank.

Tsunade raised an eyebrow in disbelief. "You're yelling because your old computer died?"

"It's not just my old computer! He was the love of my life! And now he's dead! Dead!" Naruto moaned in despair.

"I got you a new one for school a few days ago, so why does that one dying matter?"

Naruto groaned. She didn't get it. She didn't get it at all. "I didn't finish transferring all of my files! They're gone! All gone!"

"You know, you can go take it to a computer store and they can take all that stuff out, right?" Tsunade said with an eye roll and the teen continued to lament the loss of the laptop, apparently he hadn't heard her words.

"I'll take you to one next week, so quit your crying!"

Naruto finally heard her words and brightened up immediately. "Really? I didn't know that! Thanks', Baa-chan!"

"Brat!"

**Next Day:**

Naruto walked into the hallway of Academy High, humming to himself as he dodged people that didn't seem to notice if he was in their way or not. He didn't really care if they saw him or if they looked right through him like he wasn't even there. That was fine with Naruto, he'd always been awkward with people, especially since they tended to dislike him no matter if he did something or not. Naruto didn't know whether it was that he tended to be loud and obnoxious at times or his name or even the fact that he was new to the school. People just disliked him.

That's why he'd learned to blend into the back ground when he didn't want to be loud. He was bothered less that way, making life a little easier. And he wasn't even lonely. School friends might have been non existent but he did have a few good ones, even though he'd never personally met them.

Ever since he'd started writing fan fictions, the whole world ceased to cause him as much pain or hardship. Now he lived for his followers online. The reviews, the comments, the private messages. They were his drug, his life. People online were friendlier then the ones he dealt with in his real life -besides his new adoptive parents and a few teachers of course. They actually liked him and wanted to be his friend. They wanted to talk to him, get to know who he was just because they thought that he was a good writer. It was fantastic. The first few times that had happened, Naruto couldn't believe it. Then Naruto stopped doubting himself and let his personality show through, making friends with anyone that showed the interest.

Naruto thrived. He was honestly surprised that he hadn't written anything for his fandoms before. Usually, it was random ideas for future books but never fanfictions. How he hadn't started sooner, he didn't know. It would have made life a little less lonely back then. Oh well, at least he had it now.

Just then his phone gave a buzz. Naruto fished it out and squinted to read the words that scrolled across the very top of the phone.

It was one of his friends on fan fiction, he'd known Haku for a few months now any they'd become fast friends.

Haku had read one of his fic's and had left a review, saying what he'd liked and what he thought that Naruto should work on. Naruto had immediately replied, wanting to thank him for the advice. He always loved reviews like that, they helped him focus on what he should work on and try to do better for the next time he wrote. From then on, they had messaged each other as often as possible. Then, they'd exchanged Skype information just a few days ago since they talked all the time on the website, and they'd deemed it easier to communicate through some other means. With a grin, Naruto opened the Skype app and tapped on the icon that said new message.

_**Haku-**__I just finished writing my first story last night. Would you beta read it for me? I mean, if you aren't too horribly busy? I would have asked yesterday but as soon as I finished it, I just passed out. _

Naruto couldn't help but let a grin cross his face in excitement. This was the first time that someone had asked to beta read a story!

_-Of course! Just send me the doc and I'll get to it as soon as schools out!_

_**Haku**__-Awesome! Thanks a lot, Naruto!_

_-No problem, Haku!_

Naruto let one more grin cross his face before stuffing his phone back into his sweater pocket and going on his way again. He really needed to get to his class, since he had a bit of time until the bell, he had to finish up some homework that he hadn't gotten the chance to even touch at home since he'd had his melt down about his Tommy-chan. When Naruto got to the room, the place was practically empty, not even the teachers were there. Quickly, Naruto took his seat at the back of the class and zipped open his orange backpack, taking out the homework and also a notebook he used to write his fan fiction ideas. Some pages had the outline of a story on them while others were the beginnings of chapters or parts of them. His gaze landed on the homework first, then at his notebook.

Against his better judgment, Naruto opened his notebook and started outlining a new story. He'd thought about it just before his old Tommy-chan died but hadn't gotten the chance to write it down yet.

"I'm going to regret this..." Naruto muttered to himself, giving his homework one last glance before completely forgetting about it and focusing on his new fandom obsession, Attack on Titan. He'd been reading fan fictions for that for a week straight and now he felt he was ready to get started on his own idea. It would only be a one shot, Naruto really didn't have the time to do more then that honestly. He'd been cranking out chapters left and right for his previous obligations, but he really wanted to do this because he was itching for it. The idea just wouldn't leave him alone, not one bit. That's why he knew that getting it done would quell his creativeness for the time being so that he'd be able to get out a few more chapters for his three main priorities. With one final grin, Naruto bent over the notebook. He wrote a few idea's before starting to put together a few words, then let it flow out, completely immersing himself in his own world.

_Levi watched the new recruits with a critical eye as they began to train. Some of the newbies had potential. He turned to look for the one that wasn't like everyone else and his sharp eyes quickly found him over with Levi's squad. The kid was paying close attention to what Petra was saying, eye's constantly scanning the papers that were in front of them. Levi narrowed his own eyes, thinking. The kid was completely healed. It had only been a few days since he'd kicked the shit out of him, and right at that moment the kid was at one hundred percent._

_Unbelievable. _

_Finally, Levi tore his eyes away from Eren Jeager. Why was he even thinking so much about him? Ever since he'd set his eyes on him as he'd been cut out of the titan..._

_And then in the cell. _

_The look in his eyes, the way he'd gazed at Levi through the bars..._

_It had been mesmerizing._

_Exciting._

_Levi had wanted to-_

"Naruto!"

"Gah!" Naruto's head shot up, face immediately heated as he saw that everyone was looking at him, some of them were snickering into their hands.

When the hell had class started? How much time had passed since he'd started working on the story?

"About time you decided to join us, Naruto." The teacher, Iruka- sensei said, frowning down at the blond who's face was as red as a tomato.

"Sorry, sensei." Naruto muttered horrified as Iruka kept looking at him with a frown on his face before turning away, and back to the lesson that Naruto hadn't even noticed had begun.

A few people giggled, and some other's laughed outright at the look on Naruto's face. Slowly, the blond sank a bit deeper into his chair until he couldn't go any farther without sliding out of the seat completely. That had been embarrassing.

At least Iruka hadn't decided to read what he'd been writing. That would have been worse then humiliating. Yeah, he enjoyed when people read his stuff... but the people that read his fan fictions were usually looking for what he wrote. It was pretty hard to mistake a yaoi warning as anything else really. Now, these people... They would probably make fun of what he wrote. He definitely didn't want to risk them finding out about his hobby. He already got enough grief as it was, he didn't need to pile any more onto his boat.

Discreetly, Naruto slipped the notebook into his back pack and turned his attention to the lesson that didn't make any sense.

Algebra.

The worst subject that he had. No matter how hard Naruto tried, he just couldn't get the problems. It was impossible for his mind to focus on it and follow it through to the solution. Inwardly, he groaned in despair as Iruka passed out the worksheet for them to work on during the rest of the class.

It was a nightmare. Within minutes, Naruto had his head between his hands, staring down at the paper like he could set fire to it with the power of just his glare.

Not that anything like that would ever happen, no matter how much Naruto would wish otherwise.

What the hell was he supposed to do? How the heck was he supposed to solve the ridiculous problems? He was going to fail. It was already a given. Last year he'd passed by the skin of his teeth, but not this year. This year... this year Naruto was going to fail. He just knew it.

This time, the groan managed to go past his thoughts, luckily it wasn't that loud and only the people closest to him even heard it.

One of them just flickered his eyes over to Naruto before turning away again. The other one was stretched out on his chair, arms behind his head. His eyes stayed a bit longer on the blond before turning back to his study of the classroom ceiling.

Naruto managed to hold back his blush this time, the two that sat closest to him weren't that bad. They mostly ignored Naruto, though they did acknowledge him every once in a while. More then the rest of the student body, that was for sure.

One, Sasuke Uchiha, mostly kept to himself. He never really talked to anyone, but he was pretty popular with all the girls and he sort of hung out with a group that Shikamaru was included in along with several others. Though, since transferring into the school, Naruto hardly seen the broody teen speak more then a few words with anyone.

The other, Shikamaru Nara, that one did talk to a lot of people but he liked slacking off during class and wasn't really into over exerting himself. Now, with Shikamaru, Naruto had an ongoing obsession with. He was just so cool and sometimes Naruto would write character's with Shikamaru's personality for the fun of it. Smart, handsome, and athletic were good qualities, at least Naruto thought so. It didn't hurt that he'd never made fun of Naruto or been unpleasant at all.

Naruto would have loved to talk to either one, have an actual conversation and maybe become friends. It had all been a complete bust though since Naruto wasn't exactly talkative to strangers and most people ignored him, especially after learning his last name. People tended to give him an extra wide berth after that. Which is exactly what had happened after that first day he'd been at Academy High. Any potential friends quickly dropped off the radar after that fiasco.

Friends... Naruto used to have two close friends when he was smaller and still moving around in foster care, a long time before he was adopted by his Baa-chan... Their faces were blurred whenever he tried to remember them clearly... but no matter how hard he tried to picture them, nothing sharpened, features stayed blurred. He did have something, just one thing, but it helped Naruto to believe that he really did have them at one point in his life. To affirm that they had been real and not just a figment of a young child's imagination. Sasu-chan and Ita-chan. His nickname for them. Naruto could never remember the rest of their names, but those two nicknames had stuck with him. That wasn't the proof that they had been real though. Just before they had been separated- well that wasn't it... before Naruto was kidnapped and then found and then sent to a completely new city and foster home- the two had given him something to remember them by just before he'd been ripped from them. A toad wallet, or as he liked to call him, his Gama-chan.

Gama-chan was still with him, he was right in his pocket in fact. Naruto hardly ever took him out, he didn't want to lose the proof of his one time friendship with those two figures from his past. His Gama-chan would always be there. A constant reminder of a happy moment during a dark and unstable time.

Then he had had Gaara. Gaara, the one person that Naruto wished he could see again, touch again, kiss again. Naruto had fallen in love with him so hard. He had been Naruto's world. Then he'd been ripped away, like everything Naruto cared about tended to be. Since then, Naruto hadn't seen or heard from the red head. No matter how hard he'd tried, how hard he looked, nothing had come up, though he still had the hope that maybe one day he would be able to see him again, even if Gaara had moved on... just being able to look and drink him in was enough for Naruto.

Naruto had met Gaara when they'd both been freshmen at Suna High. Their friendship had been instantaneous. It wasn't that they were the same, Gaara had been more even more quiet and reserved then Naruto, it was also their similar experiences. People avoided Gaara like they avoided Naruto. That was how they'd been drawn to each other. The friendship had quickly escalated to love within months, and the two teens had been inseparable. Each went everywhere together. The only place they couldn't follow one another were each other's homes. Their relationship wasn't broad casted, but people had found out about it and it had been frowned upon by more then one person, including Gaara's dad and Naruto's foster family.

Thinking of Gaara always gave Naruto's heart a shock of pain. There hadn't even been a good-bye. One day he'd been there holding Nauto's hand, kissing his lips and then the next he'd disappeared without a trace. When Naruto had asked around, he'd found out that Gaara's father had sent him away to a private school. When Naruto had gone to inquire for Gaara's address so that he could contact him, Gaara's father had refused and kicked the blond out of his house. Shortly after that, Naruto had been sent to another foster home. That had been three years ago, and still no sign of Naruto's redhead.

Then there was Naruto's online friends. There was Haku, Kiba, and a few others from online. Naruto had hit it off with all of them really well. In fact, it had been incredibly easy talking to them. To bad none of them lived close enough to even hang out with, if they were, Naruto was sure that'd he'd never be alone ever again. But it wasn't meant to be.

Just then, his phone gave a low buzz, bringing Naruto out of his mini daydream of somehow meeting Haku in real life and seeing his Gaara again.

As sneakily as he could, the blond took out his phone and glanced at the screen.

Speak of the devil.

It was Haku.

_**Haku-**__Naruto! Are you close to making that new AoT fic? I really want to read it, I've already gone through all the ones on there already. I'm stuck at home sick and I've got nothing to do... I even managed to finish that essay I had to write..._

A grin on his face, Naruto immediately started writing back as discreetly as possible.

_-Sorry, Haku. I'm working on it now, but it's not going to be done for a few days... Why don't you try looking for a few other fandoms? I'm pretty sure that there are some great fics there. How about Black Cat?_

_**Haku**__-... That actually isn't a bad idea. I'll look some up in a bit. What are you up to?_

_-Math... _

_**Haku**__-Math isn't that bad._

_-...You're so mean. Math is my worst subject ever!_

_**Haku**__-Study?_

_-... You're not helping, Haku..._

_**Haku**__-Haha, sorry. I know you can do it!_

_-Thanks for having so much faith in me but I fail at math. _

_**Haku**__-A lot of people do, don't worry about it._

_-If I fail, I'm going to have to be a senior again! I can't afford to fail another class!_

_**Haku**__-...Naruto..._

_-Yeah?_

_**Haku-**__Good luck being a super senior ._

_-Haku!_

_**Haku**__-Don't worry, I was just kidding!_

_-No, it's entirely possible...that's that sucky part..._

Naruto wilted in frustration as he once again picked up his pencil and focused on the paper. The phone slipped onto his lap as Iruka-sensei walked towards his direction. So, for the moment, Naruto ignored the vibration from the android and kept his eyes trained onto the awful paper with the evil problems all over its surface.

Okay, so he had to solve the equation... he had to... he had to...

What the hell was he supposed to do? The example made no sense whatsoever!

Finally, Iruka moved back to his desk, and Naruto glanced at his phone to see Haku's response. Except it wasn't Haku. It was an email. A new review had been posted on his Loveless fic.

With a grin, Naruto opened the email and quickly scanned though the message, his grin only getting bigger and bigger.

**Fanfiction**

**Review: Five Years Gone**

**KyuubiWriter,**

**A new review has been posted to your story. **

**Story: Five Years Gone**

**Chapter 8: The Lie**

**From: lovelyfan**

**Oh no! I can't believe it! Not one bit! Ahhhhhhh! Why did you leave it off right then!? I want to know what happens! You're so evil! But I love you! So please, please, please update soon! Gah, this chapter was so sad! My heart's still crying with Ritsuka! And Soubi! They need to hurry up and forgive each other! **

Chuckling quietly to himself, Naruto placed his phone down again, the corner of his lips twitching on his face. He really loved getting reviews, they always made him happy. Even if they were a bit critical, it was good. They only helped with his writing. The only reviews he hated were the uncalled for trolls that liked to call him mean things for writing yaoi. Those, he always ignored.

With that in mind, Naruto looked around the room for a bit. He couldn't reply to the review yet, well he could but it wouldn't be detailed because he'd be rushing himself so that he wouldn't be caught by Iruka. So Naruto had to wait, though his fingers itched to get back on his phone.

Again, it vibrated but Naruto couldn't check because Iruka was right in front of him with a frown on his face.

"Naruto, how is your work coming along?"

Naruto groaned. "I don't get it!"

"Why didn't you ask for help?"

"Can you help me, Iruka-sensei?" Naruto pleaded, ignoring the looks he was getting from some of his classmates.

"..." Iruka-sensei sighed, before leaning over to explain the method again to his most clueless student.

Naruto still didn't get it even after spending the rest of class with Iruka-sensei helping him every step of the way. Not that he actually understood much of what Iruka-sensei was trying to explain.

**Lunch:**

The day was a bit windy, but Naruto didn't mind the air that rippled through his clothes as he sat outside on the school's roof, away from anyone else. He never ate lunch in the cafeteria, it was always too crowded and he never really wanted to deal with some of the looks that people sent his way. For some reason lunch was always the time during which his fellow teenagers liked to make fun of someone. Naruto being their number one target on that front.

With a sigh, Naruto leaned against the wall and took out his notebook and his phone. He hadn't been able to even glance at it for the rest of Iruka-sensei's class, and then Naruto had gone to Kakashi-sensei's Literature class thinking that he would be able to relax for ten minutes, but it seemed like Kakashi-sensei had, for once in all year, been in the room before any of his students and Naruto hadn't been able to do anything but read the assignment.

Kakashi-sensei had eyes(or eye, since he liked keeping one of his eyes and part of his face covered with a sort of half mask) as sharp as a hawk. Nothing slipped his notice, not a note passed by two friends, and definitely not someone pulling out their cell phone. A nice collection of phones, IPods, and MP3s were already sitting behind they grey haired man's desk by the first fifteen minutes of class starting.

Naruto would never let his phone out of his sight. Especially not with all the things he had in it. No chances needed to be taken, because with his luck, Kakashi-sensei would see somethings that would probably give him a heart attack. But then again, Kakashi-sensei was a pervert. Naruto had seen all those Icha-Icha Paradise books. Maybe he wouldn't have a heart attack but he would definitely be shocked. And Naruto didn't really want anyone to know anything about him. His liking yaoi was definitely on the top of his Never Find Out, and Keep Secret Forever lists.

At least he was a lot better with Literature then he was with Algebra, so the class itself was enjoyable.

Naruto had taken a Creative Writing class during one of his old schools and that had jump started his obsession with writing. Sure, he'd been dabbling in writing on his own before that, but he never really tried until that class. Ever since then, any class having to do with writing or reading was Naruto's favorite, including Kakashi-sensei's Lit. class.

With a smile, Naruto pushed the power button, and the screen flashed on, showing three icons at the very top. Two Skype messages and one email. With another smile, Naruto ignored the email for the the moment, and tapped open his Skype. Haku had sent him messages during the time he hadn't been able to look at his phone.

_**Haku- **__Well, good luck with that then... _

_**Haku-**__I found a great Black Cat fic! It's got really great sex scenes too, I feel like trying them out..._

Naruto couldn't help but blush as the words penetrated his brain. His mind showed Haku doing things he had written.

"Yup, I'm a pervert."

_-Send me the link, I want to read it!_

_**Haku- **__(Click Link) There it is! There's an OC paired with Train. Not bad at all, and the author catches your attention pretty well. Almost as good as you, Naruto._

_-Aww, Haku! That's so sweet of you!_

_**Haku-**__It's the truth. I've got to go, Zabuza's finally home!_

_-Alright, talk to you later!_

Naruto couldn't help but chuckle. Haku was always so enthusiastic when talking about Zabuza. He didn't know whether Haku was with Zabuza but Naruto had a feeling that Haku harbored feelings for him. One reason he hadn't ever suggested a long distance relationship. Another was that he had so little friends, he didn't want to lose the few he did have by suggesting something stupid. That and he still loved Gaara, even three years later.

With a tap of the back button, Naruto opened the other conversation. This one was from Kiba, another follower of his from fan fiction.

_**Kiba**__-I just found out that my year is going on a field trip to Konoha. That's were you live, right? _

Naruto's eye's widened in excitement.

_-That's awesome! Maybe we'd be able to see each other?"_

_**Kiba**__-That's what I was thinking! Though I'm a lot more... crazy in person so don't be to shocked about the differences._

_-Don't worry! You're still Kiba no matter what! When is the trip?_

_**Kiba**__\- In a couple of months, we're going to be doing some research about something, I didn't really catch what._

_-I could help!_

_**Kiba**__\- I'm sure you would! It's gonna be awesome!_

_-So awesome!_

Naruto chuckled a little in excitement, his face stretched in a grin, and fist pumping the air. He was finally going to get the chance to meet one of his friends!

With that happy thought in mind, Naruto read the email, just someone updating one of the many stories that he was following, then clicked on the link that Haku had sent him.

_Deep Cover, By: Chibibait69_

_Train slides his eye's from left to right, measuring, plotting, and trying to gauge the distance between him and his target, weird thoughts cross through his head that have never been there before._

_Will he pull the trigger, or something completely unexpected happen? Something that could make his world explode?_

_Warning: Mature Content, BoyXBoy, Yaoi, Slash :Warning!_

Naruto blushed at that last sentence before the yaoi warning. Maybe it was just him, but he got the impression that it had to be dirty. It just had to be. There was absolutely no way it wasn't dirty, he would be money on it.

For a few seconds, the blond debated whether to start reading, but with a bit of reluctance, decided against it. If what Haku told him was true, he didn't want to have a... problem while walking around the school.

With another grin, Naruto replaced his phone with his notebook and started writing. Words flowed and pretty soon he'd finished writing three pages. They would probably be just one on his laptop but it was a start. Naruto was so immersed with his writing that he didn't notice that someone had found him.

"Naruto-kun, you aren't supposed to be anywhere near this roof."

The voice brought Naruto's head up with a start. "Ahh! Oh...Shisui-sensei... ummm, you scared the crap out of me... ummm... I did not know that..."

Shisui-sensei raised that famous Uchiha eyebrow, the one that Sasuke and Itachi-sensei also had. "Naruto..."

"Fine! I knew! But I hate being in the cafeteria! All anyone does in make fun of me..." Naruto muttered, his blue eyes looked away from his teacher's, not wanting to meet them. To Shisui-sensei, he looked dejected.

Shisui-sensei sighed, Naruto heard it and he had to control the big grin that was about to erupt on his face. He couldn't let Shisui see it, if he did, Naruto's act would be for naught. The fact was that he didn't really care if people said, did, or even when they made fun of him. He really didn't. He just loved being outside, on the roof. It was peaceful, and the view always gave him ideas for his stories.

"I'm sorry Naruto, but you're not allowed to be here, you know that very well. If another teacher had found you, you would be getting detention right now. Imagine Orochimaru-sensei coming up here and seeing you." Shisui-sensei said, making Naruto wince at the very thought for an entirely different reason then Shisui-sensei was implying. He didn't think that anybody else noticed it but Orochimaru had been overly fond of Naruto since the first day he'd laid eyes on him. Naruto definitely didn't like it. Something about him just gave Naruto the creeps and made him extremely uncomfortable. Maybe it was his eyes. Naruto had seen eyes like his before and the results of it hadn't been pretty at all. He still had the scars to prove it right on his face and body. Three cuts on either cheek and several more through out his body. They had faded but would never truly go away, and would always be a reminder of that horrible time.

Flashback

_"Remember, don't tell. If you do it's not going to be pretty for Ita and Sasu-chan... Or would you like me to hurt them too, Naru-chan?"_

_"No! Don't hurt them, please!"_

_"Then remember what I said..."_

_"I-I won't tell...so please don't hurt them..." _

_"Good boy, Naru-chan. Now, come here. I'm going to play a game with you."_

_"A-a game?"_

_"Yes, a game."_

_"Wha-" _

End Flashback

Those words made Naruto's throat constrict and a light sheen of sweat break out on his brow and he leaned his head forward to hid from Shisui-sensei's gaze. It had been a while since he'd thought about _that_, that voice with the promise of torture and pain. The helpless feeling grew and Naruto took a deep breath, trying to calm his wildly beating heart.

_He's not here, he's no where near me. Calm down. Calm down._

With a deep sigh and a quick head shake to get rid of those memories, Naruto gathered his things, making sure to hide the notebook in his back pack. Shisui-sensei was one of the only people that knew Naruto liked to write. He was his Creative Writing teacher after all. Even though he knew about Naruto's love for writing, he definitely did not know about his love for yaoi. And keeping it that way was a huge pain in the ass. Shisui-sensei was as curious as any cat and Naruto had had to resort to drastic measures on multiple occasions to get the older man to release his sacred notebook of yaoi.

"What were you writing?" On cue, the curiosity surfaced.

Naruto slung on his back pack, making sure to keep one of his hands clenched tightly on the strap. "It's just some plot lines I've been thinking up..."

Shisui nodded, a small smile on his face as he lead Naruto to the door and down the stairs. "If you don't like going to the cafeteria, why not the library? I'm trying form a club, but haven't found many people interested yet.

"A writing club?" Naruto mussed a grin appearing on his face at the thought. "That sounds pretty awesome, actually."

Shisui nodded, his eyes flashing in amusement. "I've been wanting to make one for a while, I just haven't gotten any interest from students. You're the first one that liked the idea."

"Probably because you haven't been asking the right people? You might have to combine reading and writing for it to work." Naruto suggested as they made their way to the main library. "Not many people like to write but a lot of people like reading what people write."

Shisui-sensei contemplated that for a second before replying. "Hn."

Naruto couldn't help but roll his eyes at that. It must be something Uchiha related because both Sasuke and Itachi-sensei also said that. An annoyingly amount of the time. "Sensei, for a Creative writing teacher, you know surprisingly little besides 'hn' in response to a conversation..."

With his own role of his eyes, Shisui-sensei left Naruto outside the library doors and headed back on his way to his classroom.

"Next time, instead of the roof or the library, how about I go to your classroom, eh sensei? And while we're at it, you might as well host the club meetings in your room! You might get a lot of the girls to come if you do it that way!" Naruto called after the teacher with a grin before stepping into the almost empty library, not waiting to see the response that the sensei would give him after what he'd told him.

Shisui-sensei was popular, extremely popular. He, like Sasuke, and Itachi-sensei, had a fan club following him around. It must have had something to do with the Uchiha genes because nobody had a fan club like they did. Naruto liked to tease his sensei about it, and Shisui-sensei had always told him that if he kept going, then he was going to fail Naruto. It was an empty threat and they both knew it, Shisui-sensei loved Naruto's writing and would never be able to put anything but the earned grade and Naruto took full advantage of that fact, teasing him mercilessly.

The fact that Shisui-sensei actually teased him back, made Naruto think that they were friends. Or if not friends yet, then well on their way to becoming it, even with the age difference.

Like Shisui-sensei had said, the library was practically empty. The only person in there at all was the librarian. With a smile and a small wave towards him, Naruto headed towards one of the tables near the window.

"Naruto, I found something you might like." The librarian walked over to him,

"Really? Thanks, Kabuto-san!" Naruto glanced down at the tittle of the book, a smile on his face.

"It's a little bit of a darker series but it's very good."

"I'll try it out! Never herd of it before... Oh! Kabuto-san, the other day you were telling me about a writing contest, remember? Do you have the information on it? I really want to try it out!"

"Of course, it's in the book." The grey haired grinned down at him before walking away with a wave. "I hope you win."

"Thanks again!" Naruto practically yelled, too excited to keep quiet. It was a good thing that they were the only people in the library so Kabuto just let it go but Naruto blushed in embarrassment. "Sorry!"

Again, Kabuto gave him a wave, this time with a chuckle. Naruto sighed in relief then opened the book, a piece of paper was folded in half and placed between the first few pages of the book. He quickly picked it up and unfolded it, eyes scanning down the page, the grin on his face getting bigger and bigger the longer he read.

"I so want to win!"

"I'm sure you will, oh, don't worry about the entry fee Naruto. I already signed you up because the deadline's going to cut it close."

"Eh? Really? Thanks Kabuto! I'll pay you back!"

"Oh, don't worry about it Naruto. It was my pleasure." Kabuto gave the teen a smile.

And for some reason, Naruto got the chills. "Brr, I need to start bringing my jacket! Thanks again! I'm definitely gong to win!"

"I'm sure you will, Naruto."

For the rest of the day, Naruto was in heaven, not even being in Orochimaru's class could bring him down. Anytime he had a free moment, he opened his notebook and outlined a new chapter for his short story that he would be entering in the contest. The theme had been love, any kind of love just as long as it was love, whether it be family love, friend love, or romantic love. He'd already planned on something and was working on it before the contest so he was relatively ahead on the time line. He'd have plenty of time for editing and fixing before sending it in.

Naruto had decided to write a modern day story with mythical creatures and humans. There would be a lonely human, Damien, born with a special power that mythical creatures and some unsavory humans want. He gets a body guard but doesn't know about him. This body guard would be a young elf from the hidden valley of Afrel. Elves usually stayed out of the dealings of humans and other creatures but the power that Damien has is too dangerous to leave unprotected from the hands of evil so that's where Thomeas came in. He was the only Elf that looked like a human, his features less fair then the rest of his race. That helped him blend in with the human population. The only major differences were his eyes and ears. Long hair kept the ears hidden, but his eyes needed a little... magical help. A simple spell turned his eyes from purple to a more common blue colour. Thomeas integrated himself in Damien's life, keeping things away from him without the teens knowledge. But during that time, Damien sees him and grows attached, and love slowly bloomed between them. Of course, there had to be drama, danger, and almost loss but Naruto hadn't gotten to that part yet. He'd have plenty of time for writing later that day.

The last bell of the day rang, startling Naruto out of his story line thinking. With a quick shake of his head, he put his things away into his backpack, making sure that his two notebooks were safely inside. By the time he was finished, he was the last person in the room.

Or so he thought.

"Naru-chan." The way his name was said in _that_ voice made Naruto's blood run cold. For a second, instead of a classroom there was a room with no windows and a cot in the corner and _that_ man was whispering in his ear.

With a flinch, Naruto was jarred out of the memory by that same voice again.

"Did you need any help?" Orochimaru asked, a weird gleam in his eyes as he stepped closer towards the blonde.

Naruto shifted away slightly, trying to keep a distance between them and also to calm mind from the memory of that dark past.

_I'm not in that room. I'm not with that psychopath. He's not going to hurt me, not ever again._

A deep breath later, Naruto took another step away from his Chemistry teacher and cleared his throat. He glanced into Orochimaru's eye's for a split second. When their eyes connected, his heart constricted with dread. They were _his _eyes. Never before did they match so much with Naruto's memory of _his_ eyes. The eyes that loved boring into him, promising pain, misery, agony and despair. Naruto took several staggering steps away from him and stammered out his reply. "Uh, no, I'm fine, I was just leaving..."

"Don't be shy, if you need any help, you can always come to _me_." The words dripped from his mouth with a definite double meaning that Naruto hoped was just his imagination. It had to be, no teacher would be stupid enough to imply anything to a student. "I'm so glad to have you as my student, _again_."

That was odd, Naruto had never had Orochimaru before. He was extremely sure about that. Why would he say he was glad to have him again?

Just before Naruto turned away from the man completely, a flash of _something_ passed through Orochimaru's face. For a second, as he walked away, Naruto could have sworn that Orochimaru had been that man. But it couldn't be. The man was long gone and Orochimaru was someone else entirely.

Wasn't he?

**A/N: What do you think? Interesting, not? Let me know! Sorry for any mistakes, my beta doesn't like Naruto, so I'm not going to force him to beta it xP**


	2. Chapter 2

**Note: Sorry for any mistakes on here, my laptop does not do spell check...**

**Chapter 2:**

_The sob tore through Naruto's throat, arms wrapped around his knees. He'd been trapped in this room for a long time, with that man coming in every little while. He was creepy, Naruto didn't know why he'd gone and locked him in there. He was supposed to have taken him home because his foster parents hadn't shown up._

_The man had been nice at first, saying he'd wanted to be Naruto's friend. He'd been the first adult to say that to the five year old. Not even the people that fostered him paid that much attention to the little blonde kid. The man had been talking to him since the first day they'd met at the dojo, the man had taken to teaching Naruto. He was the only one, the other sensei ignored him and just focused on the other kids like Sasu-chan and Ita-chan. _

_Naruto had felt so happy that someone was actually paying attention to him. He'd started to stay late and was alone with his sensei a lot of the time. Usually it was just and hour and Naruto loved it. His sensei would teach him a lot of cool things that he didn't teach when the others were around._

_Then one day..._

_"Naru-chan, what's wrong? Why are you still here?" Sensei's voice sounded from behind him. The man had just walked up to the dojo. He hadn't been there that day and the other sensei had completely ignored him in favor of the other kids. When class had ended, Naruto had waited with Ita-chan and Sasu-chan until their parents had come for them and then he'd waited alone._

_Naruto had been waiting for his foster mom to come pick him up but she hadn't shown up. It had been hours since his class time had ended so Naruto was surprised that she hadn't come yet. That had been the longest she'd ever taken._

_"How someone could leave someone as precious as you all alone.." Sensei muttered, picking him up. _

That dream melted into another one. A harsher one.

_Naruto's blue teary eyes looked up at the tall man in front of him. He'd been trapped there for a while and the one thing he wanted was to go home. He just wanted to go home._

_"Naru-chan, why are you crying? I'm not being mean, in fact, I love you Naru-chan. I want you to be mine forever. Here, I'll even give you a present. It'll hurt a bit but I'm sure you can handle it."_

_"Wa-wait! Please don't!" Naruto cried out as he tried scooching away from the mad man with the knife. His legs wouldn't work and he was to small to force the man to stop. "Th-that's not how you show lo-love!"_

_"No? But Naru-chan, it's how I show my love."_

_The scream that ripped through Naruto's throat should have brought the world running. Sadly, no one heard._

_"Shhh, Naru-chan, don't cry. It just shows that you're mine. The lines even make you look like a baby fox. You love baby foxes, don't you? Well now you look like one! I can't wait to see you all grown up, Naru-chan. You'll be irresistible."_

"Brat! Wake up! you're going to be late for school! I've got breakfast on the table! Hurry up or Jiraiya will eat it all!"

Tsunade's screeching voice so early in the morning made Naruto wake up in a heartbeat. Usually it would have taken something more then that for him to even open his eyes but that night had been rough. Non-stop tossing, turning with his stomach bunched up in knots from constant thinking and wondering and dreading. He'd only just managed to fall into a fitful sleep about an hour before Tsunade's yelling had made him bolt upright in his bed. Even then, the memories ensured that that one hour of rest was usless.

"Coming!" Naruto yelled out, not particularly happy about it being time to go to school. At least he wouldn't be seeing his Chemistry teacher that day. Thank Kami for B days.

One thing that Naruto liked about this school was that they separated their schedule. Four classes each day. On A day he had Algebra, Literature, Lunch, free period(Since he was a senior, he had one free class), and Chemistry. On B days he had Spanish, Physical Education, Lunch, History and Creative Writing.

Naruto quickly brushed his teeth and washed his face. In next to no time, he had his clothes on and grabbed all his school things. He made his way down to the kitchen and sat down across from Jiraiya whom had already made his way through a huge stack of pancakes. Taking two of the fluffy, warm pancakes, Naruto plopped them onto the empty plate in front of him. He swiftly spread some butter on top and drizzled a little bit of syrup. Once done with that, he cut into it and began to eat. He only finished about half of it before pushing the plate away and gulping down a whole glass of milk. "Thank you, I'll see you guys later."

"That's all?" Tsunade asked in surprise. Usually, Naruto would eat just as much as her husband, if not more then him.

Naruto just nodded, waved and left out the door. It was early enough that he could walk to school instead of taking the bus. He didn't feel like sitting in a confined space full of teenagers just yet, though he knew it would happen sooner then he would potentially like. And the fresh air would help clear his mind and wake him up a bit since his fail at sleeping the night before. Though he had managed to finish writing his short story on his notebook during that time before he'd tried to fall asleep. It wasn't complete or anything close to it but the majority of the writing was done and that was all good.

About twenty minutes later, Naruto made it to his school. He was still surprisingly early, though there were a few students around the area.

Two of them happened to be Sasuke Uchiha and Shikamaru Nara. They were standing just outside the doors, seemingly waiting for someone. Naruto sent them a curious look before throwing open the door and making his way to his first class of the day, Spanish.

Why he'd even decided to take it was a bit of a mystery. Naruto could have sworn that he'd chosen Latin instead of Spanish... Oh well, it wouldn't hurt to have four languages on hand. Though next term he'd make sure to take Latin II. He liked that language, and he wanted more knowledge of it just because it sounded nice.

As Naruto walked down the long hallway, he noticed that there was someone following him. He shot a look over his shoulder to see who it was and saw the Uchiha and Nara a few feet behind him.

That was kind of odd... So that meant that they weren't waiting for someone? Naruto mentally shrugged, already forgetting about it. It wasn't like it had anything to do with him anyway.

A few minutes later, he walked through his Spanish class' door and made his way to the back of the classroom.

"Good morning, Naruto." A voice called from the front of the classroom. "Sasuke, Shikamaru. You three are early this morning."

Naruto nodded to him but didn't say anything.

"Morning, Asuma-sensei. Shikamaru replied, stepping up to his desk. "Here's the work I missed on Friday." He handed over a couple of papers before going to his seat with Sasuke right besides him. They sat right in front of Naruto, and the blond tilted his head to the side in confusion. In this class the two usually sat near the front of the room...

Asuma raised an eyebrow at the new seating arrangement but didn't comment as he looked through the pile of papers that were on his desk.

Naruto took out his notebook and new laptop and began to type the third chapter in his story that he would submit in a few weeks. Making sure not to mess up too much, Naruto quickly finished that chapter up just as the bell rang. He was too engrossed in his task that he didn't notice the two pairs of eyes watching him discreetly that whole time.

The loud ringing of the bell made Naruto jump in surprise. A quick glance around showed that no one else had arrived yet. Naruto made sure to save the chapter and that his laptop shut down fully, before closing it and putting it back into his back pack, along with his notebook. He took out his Spanish binder and waited for the rest of the class to trickle in.

"Sasuke!" Two girls voices screeched. The pitch that they reached made Naruto flinch. By the look of it, both Shikamaru and Sasuke shuddered as the duo made their way towards the Uchiha, trying to slap each other out of the way as they went.

"I was looking all over for you!" Sakura practically yelled.

"What do you mean you where looking for him?! I was looking for him! Sasuke, remember you told me you'd meet me in the cafeteria for breakfast?" Ino interrupted, shooting the Uchiha a smile that looked more a cat wanting to sink its teeth into a mouse.

"Scary..." Naruto muttered to himself, and subtly tried to slide his desk a tad bit farther from the disturbing scene. He didn't notice that Shikamaru had heard him and agreed with him whole-heartedly.

"Sakura, Ino, please take your seats, the bell is going to ring soon." Asuma said, he stood up and made his way to the front of his desk and leaned back on it.

"Sorry, Asuma-sensei." The girls called out. They didn't even seem to notice that Sasuke had a different seat because they were busy trying to get ahead of the other since they sat right next to each other on the right side of the room, away from where Naruto sat.

Once they were gone, all three males visibly relaxed.

"Troublesome women." Shikamaru muttered and Sasuke 'hn-ed' in agreement. Naruto couldn't control the small chuckle that escaped at those words.

More students walked into the classroom, and as the last of the stragglers sat down, that was when the two girls noticed the slight change of seating arrangements.

"We can do that?!"

"No." Asuma stated clearly getting a bit frustrated with the two teen girls. If he let them move, it was practically guaranteed that they would sit next to Sasuke and nobody would be able to do their work.

The chorus of aww's from every single girl in the room was somehow not surprising.

"Thank god." Naruto muttered, turning to look out of the window for a moment until Asuma started talking about their next lesson.

"Alright class, take out your book and start reading chapter three. When you're done, start the worksheet on page twenty of your workbook." Asuma said, watching as everyone reached into their book bags for the required books. "If you want to work in groups of two or three, then that's fine but only with the people around you. Moving from your seat is not allowed." At the last bit, Asuma shot a look at Sakura and Ino who had already tried to get up before hearing the rest of the sentence.

Naruto opened his book and immediately began to read the chapter. He didn't really like group projects, so he didn't turn to the two people closest to him, just immersed himself in his work. He wasn't that fastest learner but he also wasn't the slowest so he usually finished solo projects by the end of the class.

A quiet clearing of a throat had him glance up a bit startled. Shikamaru and Sasuke were both looking at him. It looked like Sasuke was about to reach out to him to like they'd been trying to get his attention for a while and finally decided on physical contact as the best course of action to grab Naruto's attention. Good thing he'd noticed before they actually did try to touch him. Sometimes he reacted badly to contact unless he was sufficiently warned of the possibility ahead of time.

"Um... I'm sorry... Did you need something?" Naruto asked quietly, subtlry leaning away, and making sure not to meet their eyes.

"We were just wondering if you wanted to join our group?" Shikamaru said, while he studied Naruto intently.

Sasuke just nodded in agreement with him.

"Ah... I'm fine. I do better by myself then in a group..." Naruto stammered. He wondered why the two were even talking to him.

"Come on, we need a bit of help with this actually. That's why we want you to join us." Shikamaru gave a half grin to Naruto, eyes hooded.

Naruto's blond eyebrow rose in disbelief at that. Shikamaru and Sasuke were two of the top academic students of their year, there was no way that they needed any help whatsoever from him. The looks they gave him made Naruto give in. "Alright..."

Both Shikamaru and Sasuke turned their desks around so that they would face Naruto and all three began to work. As Naruto had thought, neither really needed any help at all though every once in a while they would ask him a question like they remembered they were supposed to need help. By the time they reached the midway point of the period, all three were finished with everything, and Naruto admitted to himself that he would have taken longer if he had been doing it by himself. It was nice having free time.

"I'll take the papers to Asuma-sensei's desk." Naruto offered, holding his hand out so the other two could place the papers there.

"Thanks, Naruto." Shikamaru gave him a grin and Naruto nodded his head without saying a word. He quickly made his way to the front of the class and plaiced the papers in the turn in tray on the edge of the desk.

"Done already?" Asuma asked a bit surprised.

Naruto nodded and Asuma reached in to grab the paper so he could skim through it. That's when he noticed that it was more then one. His eyebrow raised and he watched as Naruto walked back to his desk. That's when he noticed that Sasuke and Shikamaru had turned their desks to work with Naruto.

"Ah..." Asuma nodded to himself before turning back to his grading. He still had the classes from the day before to finish before he started on that class' ones.

Naruto sat down on his desk and took out his fanfiction notebook, he really needed to start on the next chapter for his Loveless one. He had promised to update it within the next two weeks and he really didn't want to go back on his word on that one. Just then, his phone vibrated in his pocket. With a start, Naruto realized that he hadn't even looked at it once that day. He'd been preoccupied with other thoughts earlier, then he'd gotten distracted with wondering why Sasuke and Shikamaru wanted to work with him that it had slipped his mind.

Since he was done with his work, Naruto figured he could take a look. He reached into his pocket and pulled out his phone, making sure that its view was blocked by the desk and his book bag that he'd just placed up there. Asuma was nice about phones if they accidently rang in class but he still confiscated them if he saw them out.

_**Kiba**__-Yo, Naruto! How's your story coming along? Almost finished with it? _

_-Hey Kiba! I've got most of it down, I just need to type it up and tweak a few things here and there. _

_**Kiba- **__Awesome, dude! You'll win that contest easy. As soon as they publish it, I'm going to get it! The little you told me about it sounds really interesting!_

Naruto didn't notice that he was being watched by Sasuke and Shikamaru from the moment he'd taken his notebook and phone out. Both watched as a grin appeared in the blonds face and they were more then a bit surprised because Naruto never really smiled in front of anyone.

Naruto, of course, smiled all the time at school. The thing was that he was always looking down when he smiled or showed any for of happiness. All anybody ever really saw was the top of his blond head in all honesty.

Sasuke was intrigued, and he wanted to know who was making Naruto so happy. "Who are you talking to?"

Again, Naruto was startled at how intimate they were being. Was it 'Talk to Naruto Day' or something...? "My best friend..." Naruto answered, not giving out more then that.

"Does he go here?" Sasuke wondered in surprise. He didn't think that Naruto talked to anybody at the school.

"Ah, no." Naruto shook his head, his eyes drifting down to the phone as it vibrated again.

"Oh, so he's from your old school." Shikamaru said nodding his head thinking that he'd figured it out.

"Actually, I've never met him in person before." Naruto corrected as he typed his response to Kiba's question about whether he was planning on posting the Levi/Eren fic anytime soon.

"You have a best friend that you've never meet before?" Sasuke's eyebrow shot up big time in shock.

"Yea...I've got two best friends and a few good friends that I've never met." Naruto said a bit distractedly as both Haku and Kiba messaged him, making the phone buzz twice as long as normal. "You've never had a friend or a best friend that you've never met in person?" Naruto said it like it happened all the time. For him it did at least so he figured it happened to a lot of other people too.

"Not really..." Sasuke shared a look with Shikamaru.

Naruto shrugged still more then a little distracted. "Huh..."

_**Haku- **__How's school going? I felt well enough to go in today..._

_-As in Zabuza made you go?_

_**Haku- **__... that's basically it..._

_\- Haha, dummy. If you miss too much school, you're going to regret it later._

_**Haku- **__But it's so boring_!

Naruto couldn't help but snicker at that.

"And you're not scared that the might be lying about who they are?" This time it was Shikamaru who asked.

"Even if they're lying, it wouldn't really matter to me. They're my friends, it's not like I'm going to be dating them. Haku's already got a boyfriend that he's devoted to and Kiba isn't into guys so its not like we're going to fall for each other even when he comes in a few months."

"You're more talkative then I thought you were." Sasuke said in amusement though the carefree way Naruto talked about people he never met before was worrying.

"Yeah, once I get going, I don't really stop. But so far only you two have actually tried talking to me. Why is that, anyway? You practically ignored me since I got here two weeks ago, why start talking to me now?" Naruto asked, finally looking up from his phone and glancing from one to the other.

"Well... We were honestly waiting for you to talk but you didn't seem up to it after someone said what your last name was that first day you got here... So we decided to get to know you and see if you wanted to hang out with our group during lunch." Shikamaru placed his elbow on his desk and held his head up with his hand.

Naruto shrugged, not committing to anything just yet.

"I noticed you opened up to my cousin Shisui pretty easily and I thought it'd be the same way with us but you never talk to anyone."

"Yeah, I tend to stick to myself. I've been burned too much with false friendships from people my age that I don't really trust people anymore. Except online. Nobody knows who you are, they only judge you by the stuff and work you post and that's that."

"You're really blunt." Sasuke smirked again.

"Yeah, I tend to be like that. Blunt scares the fakes right away and the one's that stay know that I don't trust them and either give up or become very close because they actually try." At that last bit, Naruto's eyes softened from a memory. "Only one person actually stayed."

Shikamaru and Sasuke shared a look before Shikamaru asked another question, choosing to change the subject. "So you post poems online or something?"

Naruto was about to correct him again, when he paused. He really was sharing a lot of personal information, and he still wasn't sure that they didn't have a hidden agenda. So instead of saying that he wrote fan fiction, Naruto nodded.

Shikamaru noticed the hesitation but didn't push for more. Instead he asked about joining them for lunch again.

"I don't know..." Naruto muttered.

"Come one, just for today. If you feel uncomfortable or if you don't like someone, you don't have to do it again." Shikamaru said and with those words, Naruto finally agreed.

Just then, the bell rang and Naruto grabbed his bag feeling a bit a relief that he was wasn't going to have class this them during the next period.

"You've got P.E. next right?" Shikamaru asked, as he and Sasuke kept stride with Naruto.

The blond nodded, feeling a bit apprehensive at the moment since they were heading in the same direction as him.

"My schedule was changed yesterday and I've got it now too." Shikamaru stated.

"I do too. Counselor said that I failed last year because I kept 'forgetting' to dress out. She changed my schedule and gave it to me during lunch yesterday. It's a pain." Sasuke muttered darkly.

And there went Naruto's relief, straight out the window.

"Good morning, Naru-chan."

And there went the rest of his good day.

Naruto slowed down, and glanced over at his Chemistry teacher that had appeared out of nowhere. "Good morning sensei..." Both Sasuke and Shikamaru stopped though they left a distance between them and Naruto. For once he wished that they had been nosy and stayed closer to him.

"Can you wait a minute? I need to discusse something with you." The small smirk on Orochimaru's face made Naruto's own face pale a bit.

"A-about my test...?" Naruto stuttered, hoping to stay in the hall.

"Yes, you missed quiet a few, and you're doing pretty poorly." Orochimaru motioned for him to go into his classroom which was empty. Naruto's shoulders sagged and he stepped into the room, throwing a last desprate look over his shoulder at his two stalkers. "I've decided to give you a little extra help so that your grades do not fall. I've already talked to the princaple and he agreed with my plans. You have a free period before my class, correct?"

Naruto nodded, feeling dread rise up when Orochimaru closed the door.

"Perfect. Once a week, you will come here and I will help you to catch up." Orochimaru placed a hand on Naruto's shoulder. The blond teen couldn't help but shudder a bit at the touch. "Here's you're paper, Tomorrow, don't forget to come here."

Naruto nodded and turned, leaving the classroom as quickly as he could without running. He could have sworn that he'd heard a chuckle following him out the room.

Naruto spotted the Nara and Uchiha waiting at the spot they'd stopped at.

"You alright?" Shikamaru asked, noticing that Naruto skin had a paled a bit.

"Fine." It wasn't like he could tell them anything that they would believe. And nobody would say that getting a creepy vide from a teacher that had been there for a while was anything to look into. And that's all it had been. "Just gotta meet with Orochimaru-sensei for extra lessons..."

With that, they reached the boys locker room and they all began to change out of their clothes. Naruto was somewhat relieved that Sasuke and Shikamaru left him alone after that. They talked to their friends that were in this class. Most of them were making plans to go to the movies later that day after school.

That was when Naruto noticed that he'd forgotten to put on his under shirt that morning.

"Damn... I knew I forgot something." Naruto muttered as he took out his sweat pants and shirt. He didn't like undressing in front of people, it made him uncomfortable and he usually had a thin shirt that he never took off when he changed in the locker rooms. That shirt helped cover the two tattoos he had. The one on his stomach had been there for a long time. He never knew where'd it come from, just that it was there. The second one he'd gotten the year he'd met Gaara. They had both gotten one a few months before getting together.

Like Naruto, Gaara had also had a previous tattoo. It was the kanji for 'love' on his forehead, and like Naruto's, it had been there for as long as he could remember. They really did have a lot in common. Ostracized by people, shunned, and feared. And they'd found each other. Recognized like souls.

Both had wanted something to commemorate their friendship. They were so alike in so many ways, in so many aspects.

Gaara had told Naruto about an old legend that he'd heard from somewhere. There were demons with incredible powers that destroyed entier villages in older times. People feared them, and so they trapped the beasts into nine humans. The humans were the jailers of the nine beasts but people treated them like they were the actual beasts instead of the containers that held them at bay. They were called the jinchuuriki.

Both Naruto and Gaara had felt a connection to that story and so the two had chosen a demon to 'house'. Gaara chose Shukaku, the one tailed demon. Naruto chose the Kurama, the nine tails.

Gaara's was easier in the fact that there was less tails to deal with, though it was still a big tattoo. It had turned out incredibly beautiful. Gaara had even added a moon in the background and it had enhanced the rest of it. Naruto hadn't been able to take his eyes off of it for the longest time ever.

Naruto's own tattoo sprawled across his whole back. It's body was crouched on his lower back, with its nine tails spread upwards, curling and looping in different directions. The snarling face of the demon was incrediblely detailed, it could almost jump off of Naruto's back. The tattoo had taken days to get done. Good thing Gaara had had a tattoo artist friend that had given both of them a discount. If he'd had a million dollars, Naruto would have given it to the artist. He deversed it.

From then on, they'd called themselves jinchuuriki, though they never showed off their tattoos to anyone except each other. More so when they'd gotten together.

Since Gaara, nobody had seen it. Not even a glimps. He'd done a pretty good job of hiding it.

Naruto waited a few minutes, pretending to look for something in his bag until everyone left to the gym. Quickly, Naruto took off his shirt, and reached for his gym shirt.

That's when he heard somone gasp behind him.

And there went his tattoo hiding ability. He should have just gone to the bathroom stalls.

**A/N: Thank you for reading! Sorry it's taken me so long to update! **

**Thank you to anyone who followed, favorited and/or reviewed! You're awesome!**

**Special thanks to JigokuShoujosRevenge and The flaming Darkness for reviewing the previous chapter! I'm not sure if I replied to your reviews because my phones PM is acting up, so if I didn't, I'm sorry!**


	3. Chapter 3

Naruto froze for a second, mentally cursing before he hurriedly placed his shirt over his head. He was just going to forget about changing his pants. Then he took a deep breath and turned around. He saw the boy that looked almost exactly like Sasuke Uchiha. He didn't know if he was an Uchiha too but Naruto knew his first name. It was Sai. They had a few classes together, and Naruto had noticed that he acted a bit weird, even for a teenager.

"That's a beautiful tattoo." Sai stated, eyes never leaving Naruto's face.

"Thank you..." Naruto replied a bit uncomfortably. "I have to go to class..." And he put his things in his locker and practically ran out of there, leaving Sai behind with a blank look on his face.

"Good morning class!" Gai-sensei boomed out as Naruto stepped into the gym, while glancing over his shoulder to see if Sai had followed him.

"Good morning Gai-sensei." The class chorused, more than a few looking like they'd rather be anywhere except there.

Naruto relaxed a little as nobody stepped closer to him. Shikamaru and Sasuke still seemed to be preoccupied with their friends. None of them were even paying attention to their gym teacher.

"Everyone start with twenty laps around the gym! Ready at my whistle!" Gai cried out happily while several people groaned in despair as the skulked to the starting line.

That was when Sai walked into the gym. Gai immediately saw him and scolded his tardiness. "Most un-youthful! I expect three extra laps!"

Sai didn't say anything, just walked over to get in line. He chose a spot right next to Naruto. He gave the blond a fake smile before getting ready to run.

"Sasuke will beat everyone!" Some girl cheered as she eyed the black haired teen.

A few other girls scoffed at her. "Of course he's going to win! He's Sasuke!"

The whistle sounded, and everyone took off at a different speed. Naruto kept his pace steady, knowing that if he pushed too hard too soon that he would tire out pretty quickly. Plus, he'd be really winded when he stopped. The steady pace for him would be better.

Sai seemed determined to stick to his side, though not a word left his lips. Naruto could feel Sai's gaze on his back though whenever he was a few feet ahead of him in the turns but that was about it. For the moment, Naruto decided to ignore him, there wasn't anything he felt he actually needed to say.

Luckily, Sai didn't seem to expect any conversations either, so Naruto sort of relaxed after that. He didn't even seem interesting in asking about the tattoo. He'd just made his observation and moved on from it. Not what teenagers usually did. Naruto was sure that if it had been Sasuke or Shikamaru, it would have been a completely different story. Questions would have come non-stop and more then likely, the whole school would know about it by the end of the day. Sai might still tell someone, but he wasn't popular like Sasuke and Shikamaru, so it was unlikely that people would believe him. Or if they did, it would take longer to get around the school.

For some reason, Naruto didn't think it would though.

But he could be wrong, he'd been wrong before.

The pair passed by their classmates that had sprinted off at the beginning and had slowed down dramatically in the six laps that they'd done so far. Now, Naruto and Sai were ahead of the rest of the group. Sai didn't falter one bit either. He stuck to Naruto's side the whole way.

When Naruto slowed down on his last lap, so did Sai. Gai-sensei didn't even notice that he'd skipped the three extra laps either because he had decided to join in on the lap running at about Naruto and Sai's fifth lap.

"Why are you... following me?" Naruto asked the quiet teen as they went to the closest wall and leaned up against it, waiting for the rest of the class to be done with their running.

Sai tilted his head to the side slightly, before opening his mouth. Before any words left, someone interrupted.

"Naruto... How did you get done so fast?" Sasuke strode up to them with Shikamaru panting and muttering 'troublesome' along the way.

Naruto shrugged with a smirk. Nobody really had his sort of stamina... except maybe Sai... though for all that Naruto knew, Sai really was exhausted but just didn't show it...

"Slow and steady wins the race..." Sai said instead.

Sasuke raised an eyebrow as he looked from Sai to Naruto and back again. "Made a new friend?"

"We are not friends. Naruto would have to feel comfortable around my presence for him to be considered my friend."

"... alright. Just remember about lunch." Sasuke rolled his eyes at Sai and walked away as Gai-sensei began shouting their instructions.

"What is with people and talking to me today...?" Naruto muttered as he headed towards the basketball court.

Sai followed. "I am talking to you because you are letting me."

Naruto gave him a skeptical look. "I'm letting you? How am I letting you?"

"You have not told me to go away. That is letting me." Sai gave a smile but something about it just looked odd...It seemed so fake...

Naruto tilted his head in thought and grudgingly had to agree with Sai's answer. He hadn't really told him to leave him alone. "Alright then... why haven't you ever talked to me before...?"

"Because you weren't interesting."

"...Ouch..." Naruto muttered, Sai didn't pull his punches. "So now there is something interesting about me...?"

"Hn."

Naruto could help but ask the question that had been circling his mind and that was the perfect opportunity. "... Are you an Uchiha...?" He reached out to grab a basketball that had rolled its way over to them from somewhere.

"No." Sai swiped the ball that Naruto had grabbed and began shooting it into the basket. "I'm an orphan.

"Ah..." Now Naruto felt a bit awkward. He hadn't thought that his question would take a turn in that direction... "I am too..."

"I know. With your last name, it's hard not to know." Sai stated, not seeming bothered one bit. "It is why you isolate yourself."

"Pretty much..." Naruto said, feeling a bit uncomfortable with the direction the conversation was going. But then again, he always felt uncomfortable when his last name was brought up. It meant people knew about his past. About his mother's past.

And about his older brother.

Not that Naruto remembered anything about them. He'd been too young when hell had broken loose, so to speak. He hadn't even known that he'd had a brother until about a year ago. Naruto had found out about him when he'd met some of his father's old friends by chance, Tsunade and Jiraiya, when they'd noticed he looked exactly like his father. After getting to know each other, they had told him some of it. It helped that Tsunade and Jiraiya had been able to adopt him, though it had taken a year, and so information had taken a while to share. They also hadn't wanted to traumatize him with his family's dark past.

Tsunade and Jiraiya had known Minato Namikaze, Naruto's father, and had been practically family with him for years. Since Minato was a teenager. He had been their unofficial son, in a way. Practically family wasn't enough to get custody of Naruto though.

His father hadn't had a bad reputation, he'd been loved and revered by the citizens of Konoha. Minato Namikaze, the police chief of the Kohona Police force. Minato Namikaze had been a hero, years of taking out drug lords, and taking down corrupt officials with seedy businesses', had earned him the position. He'd cleaned Konoha's streets, made the city safe.

And made enemies.

That was why people didn't know that Minato Namikaze was Naruto's father. They only remembered that Kushina Uzumaki was Naruto's mother, and that Kurama Uzumaki was his older brother.

Naruto's mother, Kushina, had never officially married Minato. They had been worried that the criminals and felons would target her and any children that they had if they ever did get married to get back at Minato.

The plan had been successful, and the two had had a happy life. But those had been the early years. Wonderful, joyful... unsuspecting of what would turn up. Kurama Uzumaki had been born within those glorious year. From what Tsunade had told Naruto, Kurama had been a quiet baby. Never made a fuss, even when he was older, he stayed to himself. He'd always had calculating eyes, and shown little to no emotion.

In all honesty, Naruto had always wondered what having a brother would be like... What having a family would be like... and he would might have known, if his mother hadn't gone crazy.

Kushina Uzumaki... Tsunade had told Naruto that the stress of keeping so much of her life hidden had slowly eroded her mind, and she's had a mental breakdown- though something about that didn't add up to Naruto, but he let it go for the moment-. It had started out as something small. She would get frustrated easily with Kurama. It didn't get physical for a long time, and when it did, she would lie about how he'd gotten hurt.

Minato wasn't ever home, and when he was, he would believe what Kushina had told him.

Then, when Kurama was thirteen, Naruto had been conceived. It had been a pretty big gap between them, and everyone had been surprised about the pregnancy. Kushina especially had taken it badly.

Just after giving birth, Kushina had lost it.

Naruto hadn't been able to find out much more about what happened other then she started going crazy. She'd somehow gotten one of Minato's guns and without a word(He'd been on the clock when they had given him a call to come to the hospital), began shooting at anyone in sight. Luckily, Naruto had already been taken out the room and that part of the hospital had been evacuated and locked down.

Somehow a fire had started during the shooting and when everything was over, Kushina and Minato had been found dead.

Tsunade had gotten the information from the nurses that hadn't been wounded, the police officers and Kurama- he'd told her about his mothers behavior. She had been mortified at the emotionless and accepting manner Kurama had relayed the information-. Tsunade had been there during Naruto's birth-being one of the worlds top doctors, of course she was going to be there-, but she had left with Naruto because there had been a slight problem with his vitals and she'd wanted to check him out in case it turned into something major. Good thing she had, otherwise Naruto might have left that room dead rather then alive that day.

Kurama had been just outside the delivery room. He'd been waiting there when doctors and nurses had started running out of the room and evacuating the delivery wing.

Tsunade had told Naruto that Kurama had always shown little to no emotion, the only time he ever had, had been when he'd seen Naruto for the first time just after the shooting. Tsunade had seen something flash through his eyes, before it disappeared, leaving an emotionless face behind. And then, shortly after that, Kurama had murdered thirty people.

Naruto didn't learn much else about his brother from Tsunade after that. It seemed to pain her to talk about him, so instead, Naruto had gone back to internet to research about him.

The thirteen year old, Kurama Uzumaki, had been captured and evaluated. Doctors had diagnosed him as a psychopath. Because of how young he was, instead of prison, Kurama had been sent to a juvenile facility. A year later, he had escaped, along with eight others. They had been captured a few months after that, except for Kurama Uzumaki. He was still on the run. Every few years, random murders would pop up, and Kurama would leave his signature on the body.

Naruto couldn't believe what he'd found at first. Then he'd thought about people's reactions.

When he had been younger, Naruto had always wondered why people had hated him so much. When he found out why last year, it had made his heart clench, and it made sense... in a painful way.

A mother whom had gone crazy and shoot up a hospital, killing the police chief in the process.

A brother whom was a wanted serial killer.

No wonder people gave him a wide berth. They thought he would be the next Uzumaki murderer...

Naruto mentally winced- not that he regretted it- to think, he'd had gotten a tattoo of the nine tailed Kurama, on his back. That of course had been before he'd known all the information about his family, not that Kurama Uzumaki was connected with the Kurama the Kyuubi in any way... it just would have been nice to know he'd had a brother named Kurama. Good thing it wasn't a well known story, otherwise people would think that he was idolizing his brother...

Damn people and their irrational fear of a baby... He wasn't his mother or brother!

Naruto yelped as the basketball bounced off of his head. His head throbbed and Naruto rubbed it to ease the pain. He had completely zoned out, and hadn't been paying any attention to what was happening around him.

"My apologies, Naruto." Sai stated as he swiped the ball from the air as it bounced away from the blond.

Naruto opened his eyes and looked over at Sai. "Ah, no.. My fault. I wasn't paying attention..."

Sai tilted his head, shrugged, and went back to shooting the ball at the hoop. It bounced off the rim again, and headed straight for Naruto. This time he caught it before it touched his blond, spiky hair.

Naruto could hear the squeals of delight from the other side of the gym. "Sasuke's so great! Sasuke, please be my boyfriend!" Naruto shook his head in disbelief.

"Groups of five!" Gai cried as he spotted the two of them at the far court.

Naruto glanced around and noticed that everyone else already had groups of five going. "Uh, we would, but everyone's already full."

Gai startled and looked around, obviously counting out the groups. "Right! You two will be playing one on one!" Gai threw them a thumbs up, and smiled. His pearly whites gave a blinding sparkle that had Naruto and Sai blinking rapidly to maybe help clear the flash from their eyes. It took a minute.

"Does he always do that...?" Naruto asked Naruto as they turned back to their basket. Naruto dribbled the ball for a second, before lining himself up with the basket, and let loose. The ball flew up and arced into the basket with a whoosh.

"Yes. Gai-sensei is energetic." Sai commented as he went for the ball.

An unspoken agreement passed between them. They were just going to shoot the ball instead of actually going against each other. It wasn't like Gai-sensei was paying attention to them anyways.

The rest of the class passed by relatively quickly. When Gai sent them all back to the locker room, Naruto headed to the stall with his clothes and didn't come out until he was sure that everyone left. He opened the stall door, and peaked out. Nobody was within sight. He strained to hear anything and nothing came up.

With a sigh of relief, Naruto pushed open the door the rest of the way and headed over to his backpack. He stopped short as he spotted Sasuke and Shikamaru standing against the lockers, and Sai sitting on the bench with a notebook on his lap. When Naruto edged closer, he noticed that Sai was drawing something before he looked up and shut his book when he noticed the blond coming closer.

Shikamaru pushed himself away from the lockers with a sigh. "Finally. Let's go."

With an inward groan, Naruto picked up his bag, and followed them out of the door. He hated being the center of attention- with people that he didn't know.

And no doubt they would have a lot of questions... If they had anything to do with his brother or mother, he didn't care. He was going to leave and they wouldn't be able to stop him.

"Aren't you going to buy lunch...?" Sasuke asked Naruto as he was about to head in the opposite direction from the lunch line.

Naruto hesitated for a moment. He usually just waited until school was done to eat something... But he was actually really hungry since he hadn't eaten much breakfast... With that, Naruto followed them to the line while taking out his Gama-Chan. Opening it quickly, Naruto took out a five dollar bill, and placed the green toad wallet back into his pocket.

Out of the corner of his eye, Naruto noticed Sasuke eyeing the wallet with a puzzled look. He didn't say anything though so Naruto forgot about it.

The group of boys grabbed their lunch and headed to a table on the far left of the cafeteria. Naruto and Sai stayed just behind the two others, so no one noticed them there until Sasuke and Shikamaru sat down.

Naruto eyed them wearily as the group abruptly stopped talking. Sai didn't seem bothered that they were eying him wearily too.

Shikamaru sighed. "Troublesome. Everyone, Sasuke and I invited them to eat with us. This is Naruto and most of you know Sai."

The group exchanged uneasy looks before turning back to Naruto and giving uncertain smiles and hello's.

Sasuke crossed his arms and took over the introductions. "Hinata is the only girl sitting with us. The one with the glasses sitting next to her is Shino. The one with the chips is Chouji, and next to him is Neji, he's Hinata's cousin. Lee is the one in the green sweater, and Ten-Ten is the other girl in our group. She's not here yet though.

Naruto just nodded and sat at an empty space next to Shikamaru. Sai sat on his other side. After a few seconds of awkward silence, Naruto decided to actually open his mouth. "Nice t-to meet you guys."

They all nodded and after a few minutes, began speaking to each other. Naruto relaxed slightly when they ignored him. He turned his attention to his meal.

"What school did you come from, Naruto?" Sasuke suddenly asked, causing Naruto to choke on the mouthful of noodles that he'd just stuffed into his face.

After taking a swallow of water, Naruto cleared his throat and answered the question. "The one just before was ROOT High..." Again Naruto cleared his throat, shifting his eyes away from meeting anyone else's at the table.

"ROOT High? Isn't that..."

"A disciplinary school... yeah..." Naruto stabbed his plastic fork through some noodles and stuffed them into his mouth. This was going to be the last time he'd join a group. Now there would be even more rumors about him... He could lie but eventually the truth would get out, and he wasn't really the lying type...

"Why were you sent there?" Shikamaru asked this time.

Naruto sighed quietly before looking up. He was a bit surprised at what he saw, actually. The whole group just looked curiously at him. He wasn't expecting curiosity, more like sneers, frowns, and maybe a few disgusted looks. It was sort of a relief to see something different. "It wasn't that I did anything really... I'd just gotten sent to a new foster family and t-they sent me there because they thought I was going to be a 'problem'." Naruto shrugged. He'd stayed there for his junior year of high school. It had been a nightmare to say the least. He hadn't been able to write any stories during his stay either. Good thing he'd met Tsunade and Jiraiya he month before he'd been sent to a new home. They'd been able to stay in contact and Tsunade had started the adoption process for the second time. She'd told him that she'd tried it once before, when he'd been a few months old, but something had happened and she'd lost all information about Naruto and his brother. This time, nothing went wrong except it took a long time. Tsunade hadn't been able to believe his foster parent's decision to send Naruto there.

It was a harsh school. They had been incredibly displeased to hear that he'd had a tattoo. They'd required him to keep it hidden, not that he would have showed it off to anyone. The only thing pushing Naruto though, it had been that he would be officially adopted soon. His memories of Gaara also helped.

"Ho-how long did y-you have to s-stay there?" Hinata asked quietly. The stuttering made Naruto duck his head to hide a smile. He used to be just like her, before Gaara.

"It was just for my junior year, luckily. That place is too strict." Naruto stated and noticed that Sai was nodding in agreement.

Sai spoke, which seemed to surprise the group a bit. "I went to ROOT High for my freshman year. It is not an experience that I would ever wish to repeat."

Sasuke and Shikamaru exchanged a quick look before turning back to Naruto. "Where did you go before ROOT..?"

"ANBU High.." Naruto replied, taking another bit of his food. "I stayed for my sophomore year."

Shikamaru once again decided to speak, seeming really interested for once. "A disciplinary school and a military school? That's so troublesome."

Naruto couldn't help but snort. It was good that he hadn't had anything in his mouth at that moment. It would have been embarrassing to have orange juice fly out of his nostrils. "It wasn't so bad. While I was there it was horrible but after being sent to ROOT, it was practically a walk in the park!"

The group laughed, and Naruto couldn't help but grin.

"What about freshman year?" Sasuke asked with a twitch of his lip.

It looked like he was trying hard not to smile. "Freshman year was pretty normal. I went to Suna High." Naruto couldn't help but smile as Gaara's face crossed his mind. It seemed like so long ago that they'd seen each other...

The bell rang just then, cutting off anymore conversations and Naruto's nostalgia.

Everyone parted with 'see you later' and headed to class. For Naruto and Sai, Spanish passed by relatively quickly. No big events happened at all and the History Pop Quiz was incredibly easy to do. At least for Naruto it was. He'd always loved history, and historical points in time tended to stick in his mind pretty well.

Class ended, and that was were Sai and him parted ways. Naruto went down the opposite directed that Sai went, towards his favorite class. Creative Writing.

As usual, Naruto was the first person to walk into the classroom. He spotted Shisui at the board, writing the classes prompt on the board.

"Hello, Shisui-sensei." Naruto call as he went to his seat at the front of the classroom. This was one of the two classes that he didn't mind sitting in the front row.

"Ah, Naruto! How are you? I haven't seen you all day today!" Shisui smiled and turned back to the board to finish the sentence. As soon as he was done, he turned towards Naruto again.

"Yeah... I was actually eating lunch with someone. Sasuke and Shikamaru dragged me to meet some of their friends..." Naruto smiled lightly. He hated to admit it, but he was already opening up them. Even Sai...

"With Sasuke..?" Shisui said, a grin spreading across his face. "That's wonderful! About time you opened up to people your age!"

Naruto stuck his tongue out at his teacher. "You're lucky they actually started talking to me."

Shisui smiled, and ruffled Naruto's blond hair. "You deserve some friends. Do try not to hide back in your shell."

Naruto pushed Shisui's hand off with a huff, and crossed his arms, a pout already forming on his lips. "If they start to ignore me then there's nothing that I can do, you know?"

Just then, the door slammed open, and students rushed in. Naruto glanced up at the clock and noticed that the bell would ring in a minute. Once everyone was sitting in their seats and the bell had rung, Shisui cleared his thought and caught the attention of the students pretty quickly.

"Today we're going to do the prompt on the board for about fifteen to twenty minutes, then, we're going to write three poems. It doesn't matter which format you want to use, whether it's Haiku, Free Form, Sonnet, Acrostic, ect." Shisui grinned at the chatter that arose at that. One thing about electives was that people choose what they wanted and were usually placed there. The only reason that a student didn't get their first choice elective was if the rooster was already filled or their core schedule had the same times are the elective and there wasn't another alternative time to take the elective/core class.

That meant that the atmosphere in the class was buzzing with excitement. Shisui loved that. He enjoyed teaching. Opening up minds, and setting a foundation for future writers. "Alright, you may work in groups of two if you feel like bouncing ideas off each other but nothing loud. Remember, you're not the only person in the room!"

Instantly, the chatter died down and everyone began writing the prompt in their journals.

Naruto read the line on the board, contemplating what to write on the notebook in front of him.

'Pretend you are writing a fiction book. Who is the Antagonist? Why is s/he the Antagonist? Why does s/he hate the Protagonist? Was s/he always bad or was there a catalyst?'

Tilting his head to the left, Naruto hummed quietly, eyes thoughtful. After a few more moments, he began to write.

Sounds of pens scraping on paper filled the room, and soon, everyone was finished. More than a few had gotten into it and were a tad bit disappointed that they couldn't go farther.

Shisui noticed, and he couldn't help but smirk, his dark eyes lighting up. "Not to worry, we'll be coming back to this next week."

Naruto couldn't help but feel a little(okay, a lot) excited about that.

"Gear switch, everyone! Poetry time. If you don't finish by the end of class, it's homework that you turn in at the start of the class on Thursday." Shisui said, not moving from his desk. He'd been grading papers all day, and he still wasn't done with the previous day's papers.

Once again, the sounds of scribbling filled the room, but this time there was whispering as well.

Naruto took out a sheet of paper and started tapping on it with his eraser. What would he choose? One would definitely be a Free Form, but he wasn't sure about the other two... Maybe he'd do them all Free Form? He decided to start writing a few random ones so that he could get the hang of it before starting. Maybe he'd write one he'd really like and submit it..?

"Short and sweet...something nature-ish... or not?" Naruto mumbled to himself with a small grin.

_OoOoOoOoOoOoOo_

_Crunch, the leaves crackle._

_Swoosh, the water runs by, _

_And the sunlight falls from the sky._

_OoOoOoOoOoOoOo_

_Prittle, prattle the little leaves._

_Flying, jumping, scrambling high,_

_With the help of the wind._

_Jingle, jangle, on they go, _

_Where they will stop,_

_Only the wind knows._

_OoOoOoOoOoOoOo_

_Students mumbling to each other, _

_Trying not to freeze,_

_On this cold morning,_

_And the teacher not too pleased. _

_OoOoOoOoOoOoOo_

_Love is like a tree,_

_That grows in the spring..._

_OoOoOoOoOoOoOo_

Naruto stopped writing with a frown. He wouldn't be able to use any of those, they seemed to short. The last one wasn't even done but maybe he could use it? He had plenty of inspiration for it from his time with Gaara.

Should he do the love poem...? A love poem?

_Love is like a tree that grows in the spring, _

_Spreading, lifting, living..._

_Loosing._

Naruto stopped, feeling the tears well up. Maybe a love poem wasn't such a good idea after all...

OoOoOoOoOoOoOo

Naruto waved goodbye to Shisui as he left the classroom. It had taken a while but he'd finally gotten his three poems finished. He'd finally decided on two Free Forms and a Sonnet. None of them had anything to do with love though. Every time he'd tried, it made him think of how he'd lost Gaara, and that had derailed the writing process at every try. He could write about other's love but when it came to his own...

Naruto sighed quietly as he made his way down the packed hallway. There was bodies everywhere, along with a lot of noise from people slamming their lockers shut. Not to mention the gaggle of girls always laughing, yelling and squealing.

Naruto side stepped them and went straight for the closest exit. It had been a long day and he really wanted to get home and just relax.

"Naruto!"

For a second, Naruto contemplated on just pretending that he hadn't heard anyone yell his name, but before he could make up his mind, that same someone touched his shoulder. His body immediately tensed, and he jerked out of the grip before turning around.

"Ah, sorry..." Sasuke said, his eyebrow raised a little at the reaction the Naruto had had to being touched but didn't say anything about it.

Naruto shook his head and gave him a grin. "Ah, sorry, you startled me. What's up?"

Sasuke and Shikamaru exchanged a quick look before turning back to Naruto. "Do you want to hang out? We were planning on going to the mall or going to see to the movies?"

They were really persistent, Naruto thought as he looked from one face to the other. "Sorry, I don't really feeling like going anywhere..."

The three began to walk out to the mostly empty student parking lot, and Naruto didn't see that Sasuke and Shikamaru exchanged another look.

"Naruto!"

The blond whirled over to look in the direction of that voice. It was Tsunade, and she looked like she was furious.

"Baa-chan! I didn't do it!" Naruto took a hasty step back as she got closer.

"Didn't do what?" She asked with a raised eyebrow. Then she noticed that he wasn't exactly alone. Her eyes darted from Shikamaru to Sasuke, a small smirk appearing on her face. "Oh you're not the one that's in trouble Naruto. At least not yet. But enough of that, who do we have here? Friends?"

Naruto relaxed a little. Jiraiya must have done something and to get out of the house she'd come to pick him up. But there was still a little bit of a threat, so he was cautious. "Ah, not really... This is Sasuke Uchiha and Shikamaru Nara."

Just then, Sai appeared out of no where, stopped next to Naruto and was looking at Tsunade. "And that's Sai..."

"So they are your friends!" Tsunade grinned and ruffled Naruto's hair.

That was when Sai opened his mouth. "Who's the big boobed hag?"

There was silence. Shocked silence, and Naruto started to sweat a little. Sai was going to die.

_Idiot._

* * *

**A/N: Thank you so much for the favs, follows, and reviews! I really appreciate them! Let me know what you think, please!**


	4. Chapter 4

**Chapter 4:**

* * *

One moment, everything froze, no one moved, nothing breathed. The next moment, a fist went flying.

Sai didn't see it coming. By the time it registered, he was on the ground blinking dazedly up at the blond woman shaking her fist in his face.

After another thorough smackdown where Sai ended up with more than a few bump on his head, the group of boys was herded into the black SUV and were on the road.

None of the three opened their mouths at the thought that they all shared. Kidnapping was still illegal, right?

Naruto wasn't too concerned. Tsunade had been hinting at meeting his friends, and since he hadn't even met them himself personally(he hadn't told her that bit), this was a good alternative. He even had to admit to himself that Sai was growing on him.

The ride to Naruto's house held silence from the four males, but more than a few 'hag? I'm not a hag! Ridiculous!' from Tsunade. How she had ended up dragging everyone into her car without their say-so, was a mystery since Sai was sure she didn't like him, and the other two had tried giving excuses that she just wouldn't listen to.

"Alright! I left Jiraiya to cook dinner, and knowing him, he ordered a bunch of pizza's instead of actually cooking. He'll be the one giving you rides home once everyone's full." Tsunade led the parade of teenage boys through the front door and through the living room to the other side of the house where they could smell food.

"Welcome home my lovely wife and son! I have-oh! Hello there!" A man with long white hair cried out with a grin.

The group of dark haired boys stepped back slightly as Jiraiya eyed them before he started giggling happily.

Both the blondes ignored it and stepped up to the island table in the middle of the rather large kitchen that help a total of seven pizza boxes from the local Domino's.

"Pervert." Naruto muttered to the madly giggling man. "This is my adopted father, Jiraiya. Ignore anything he says."

Jiraiya just chuckled some more before opening his mouth. "Is that your new harem, Naruto? I'm impress-!" The man was cut off when Naruto dragged him out of his chair and out the back door. "I'm kidding! I'm kidding! Nooooo! My food!"

Naruto slammed the door shut and locked it before returning to the table where Tsunade had pulled out five plates and handed them out like nothing had happened.

Sasuke, Shikamaru and even Sai had weirded out looks on their faces.

"Sorry, he has no manners." Naruto snorted, forgoing the plate in front of him and held his pizza in his hand.

Tsunade motioned the three teens to the table and they hesitantly stepped up to it, each taking a slice of pizza and placing it on their plates before sitting on the stools. "Don't be shy, there's plenty of food. Since Jiraiya can't behave himself, Naruto'll take you guys home if that's what's got you so shy."

Just then, her cell phone gave a shrill ring. "Damn." She muttered, looking at the screen before answering it. "This is Doctor Tsunade, what can I do for you? I see... We'll be right there."

Without saying good-bye, she hung up the phone. After looking through her bag for a few seconds, she pulled out a set of keys and placing them on the table in front of Naruto who was chewing on his pizza.

"Use the truck, alright? Don't stay up too late, I'm not sure how long we'll be gone." Tsunade ruffled his hair before turning to the three other teens who looked like they were stuck like deer in headlights. "Stay as long as you like, you're the first friends of Naruto's that we've met!" She had clearly forgotten about Sai's comment from earlier.

Tsunade walked over to the back door, opened it, grabbed Jiraiya by the ear and pulled him through the kitchen before disappearing again.

"Sorry she dragged you here. If you guys want to leave, just say so and I'll drop you guys off." Naruto said not looking up from his pizza. He knew that was probably what they wanted since they weren't really his friends. Tsunade liked to jump to conclusions, and she was just so happy that he seemed to have friends since he hadn't spoken to anyone since he'd started school. He wasn't about to pop her happy bubble.

"Is he Jiraiya S?" Sai asked not seeming to want to leave just yet even with the odd scene. "The author of the Icha-Icha novels?"

Naruto raised an eyebrow at him. "You read those?"

"Not really. My current foster parent is obsessed with them and has them all over the house." Sai stated before picking up his pizza and taking a bit e.

Naruto winced in sympathy at the horrors that Sai had probably walked in on while living there with an obvious pervert... "Who's your foster parent?"

"Kakashi-sensei." Sai stated simply.

Naruto's eyes widened. "Kakashi-sensei!? Really?"

"Yeah. His husband, Yamato, wants to adopt me officially. There's no point since I'm almost eighteen but he insisted."

Until that point, both Shikamaru and Sasuke had stayed silent. Neither had tried their pieces of pizza yet. They shared a look before turning back to their plates and eating their slices. Naruto wondered if they had known that about Kakashi, but judging from that look they'd shared, they hadn't known about it.

Naruto whistled." Kakashi's married? I didn't know that."

Sai nodded.

A loud right sounded through the room again and Naruto glanced down at his cell phone. It was a local number but he didn't recognize it. Naruto frowned at it for a second before picking it up. "Hello?"

"..." Naruto could hear breathing coming from the other end of the phone.

"Who's this?" Naruto's eyes narrowed.

"..." There was the noise of a grunt before the call ended.

Naruto pulled the phone away from his ear and stared at the screen for a few seconds. "What the hell was that about...?" He muttered to himself before shaking his head and ignoring it.

He took another slice of pizza and went over to the the fridge to take out a can of coke. "You guys thirsty?" Naruto brought back four cans of soda and handed them out, before opening his own can and taking a sip.

Sai opened his right away, seeming right at home. Naruto couldn't help but smile. Maybe they would become friends. Sasuke and Shikamaru on the other hand...

Them he wasn't so sure about.

Even at that moment, they looked a little awkward. Then again, it could be that they aren't used to just being dragged to strangers houses, even though one of the strangers was a classmate.

His phone rang again, but this time it wasn't a call. Naruto grinned a little as he saw Kiba's name flash on the screen.

**Kiba**: Yo, dude! Are you free later? I need some help with a project from school. The stupid teacher wanted us to study Konoha and do a presentation about it for next month. Are you willing to tell some of its secrets to an outsider? Haha

Naruto couldn't help but chuckle at that.

**Naruto**: Sure! How about in two hours? I'll be on my computer by then and can send you page links easier.

**Kiba**: Sweet! Thanks man! You're a lifesaver!

**Naruto**: No problem. I'll talk to you in a bit!

With that, Naruto put his phone down, and picked up another slice of pizza, munching on it as he frowned in thought about Kiba's project. What places would be best... The monuments would have to be on it. Next maybe the Arts Institute...

It seemed like the silence had finally gotten to Shikamaru and Sasuke because they both cleared their throats at the same time.

Sai asked the question that the other two couldn't seem to voice. "Are they always like that?"

Naruto didn't even have to ask who he was talking about. "Yeah, pretty much. Ever since I met them they've been like that. Jiraiya was holding back, so you're kinda lucky with that."

Sasuke finally seemed to find it within himself to speak up. "Does she always... take people like that?"

Naruto couldn't help but laugh, his face lightening up immensely. He didn't notice the looks that Sasuke and Shikamaru threw at each other. "She did that with me. I thought she was some crazy lady but all she wanted was to tell me that she had reminded me of someone." The fond smile didn't leave Naruto's face. He glanced at their plates and noticed that the only one still eating was him. He picked up his phone to look at the time and noticed that it was getting pretty late and his battery was pretty low. "Alright, I'll take you guys home now. Sorry about the kidnapping again. Tsunade can be a bit enthusiastic about things like that."

Sasuke and Shikamaru chuckled a little at that and they tense apmasphere seemed to disappear after that.

"I just need to get something from my room." Naruto hoisted his backpack onto his shoulder and walked towards the stairs. He heard a few shuffled steps behind him. After a quick glance to confirm that they had decided to follow, Naruto shrugged and lead them to his room.

It was a mess like always, and Naruto made a mental note to clean it sometime in the future. The trio looked around, noticing the posters on the walls. Next they noticed the amount of books and loose, scrunched up paper lying all over the place.

Naruto ignored the mess and plopped his backpack on his bed. He went searching for his phone changer. Finally, the blond found it under his bed after a few minutes of pushing dirty clothes away. Next, Naruto went looking for his red hoodie. The truck's windows didn't roll up and by the time he was done dropping everyone off it would be dark and cold.

Naruto grumbled to himself when he didn't see it in his closet. He cast his gaze around his room then it hit him. The laundry room. He had done a load of laundry the other day. Hadn't he?

Quickly, Naruto ran down the stairs and into the small room. There he found his lost hoddy. Luckily, it was in the dryer and not in the washing machine.

Up the stairs he went again, grabbed his phone, charger, keys and motion for the trio to follow him back down to the living room and out the door. He made sure to lock it before taking them to the grey truck.

"You walk to school right? Why don't you take the truck?" Sasuke asked as they climbed onto the huge beast. They'd be shoulder to shoulder but they could all fit in it.

"I like walking." Naruto grinned, slamming the door shut and stuffing the key into the ignition. "And this thing uses up too much fuel. I'd rather not go to a gas station every three days to fill it up."

Shikamaru nodded and Sasuke just raised an eyebrow at the stick shift next to Naruto. "You can drive these things?"

"What? Stick shift? It's pretty easy." Naruto shrugged and pulled out of the driveway as Sai finished buckling himself up. "Who's first?" Naruto asked as he headed out of his street.

"Shikamaru and I live across from each other in the North Valley Gardens." Sasuke replied, holding on to the dash in front him as Naruto sped the truck up.

"I live in South Gardens." Sai stated, face impassive as they went down the street.

Naruto turned right and Shikamaru grunted, placing his hand in front on the dashboard too. "North it is." Naruto gave them a foxy grin before turning his attention back to the road. It seemed like in next to no time they screeched to a stop in a very nice neighborhood. It wasn't surprising since both Shikamaru's and Sasuke's family was wealthy and hand their own corporate business. Naruto had heard of Uchiha Enterprises and Nara Corp. way before he'd even moved there.

Sai unbuckled his seat and got out, allowing the other two, slightly shaken, teens to leave the confines of the truck. They jumped out before turning back to give Naruto a wave. "Thanks man."

"See you at school." Sasuke stated as Sai got back into the truck and shut the door with a loud thump.

Naruto waved, and took off again, going up the street and turning right and right again instead of doing a u-turn.

"Do you have anymore tattoo's?" Sai asked, looking over at the blond with interest.

Naruto shook his head. He felt his phone vibrate in his pocket but decided against fishing it out. It could wait. "Nah, just that one."

"Do you want another one?"

Naruto contemplated that for a moment. "I might not. If I do, it has to mean something."

Sai nodded in understanding though his face didn't necessarily show it.

"What about you, Sai? Do you have any tattoo's?" Naruto returned as he went down the street.

His phone vibrated, but Naruto ignored it again.

"Turn left on Desert Road. I've got one." Sai said, rolling up his sleeve to show his shoulder. "I designed it. It took me a while to find someone to do it for me since I can't reach back there."

Naruto looked at the tattoo for a second, before turning back to the road. "That looks sick. You draw?"

Sai nodded, pointing to the house on the left. "I will be attending the Konoha Arts Institute after I graduate."

"That's awesome." Naruto stopped and watched as Sai got out of the truck with ease. "Can I see your sketchbook tomorrow?"

Sai nodded and waved good bye after shutting the door. Naruto watched him go up his driveway before pulling out his phone to see who had been messaging him.

The icon for his voicemail was on, so Naruto put in his code and placed his phone near his ear.

There were two messages. The first one ended quickly. Naruto delete that one before waiting for the second one to start.

A few silent moments passed and Naruto thought that it was another no message one when someone spoke. "I see you." The message ended and Naruto pull the phone away to stare at the screen with a bit of a grimace. He checked the number and noticed that both calls had had private.

"Stupid prank calls." Naruto mumbled to himself before turning on the radio and made his way home.

OoOoOoOoOoOoOoOoOoOoOoOoOoOoOoO

Ring.

Ring.

Ring.

Ring.

"Ugh, shut up.." Naruto mumbled from under his pillow, hand reaching out to where his phone was. He hadn't gotten much sleep since he'd stayed up late the night before helping Kiba with his project. He'd also finished typing three chapters for his story.

Groggily, Naruto peeked from out of his pillow, squinting as soon as the light from his screen hit him. He noticed that it was 4 a.m.

"Seriously?" Naruto groaned, emerging from his pillow nest and blearily looking through his missed call log. He'd gotten three calls, all from private numbers. "Asshole."

No one had left any voice mails this time. Naruto rolled onto his back and blinked up at the ceiling with a sigh. He doubted he'd be able to fall asleep again even if he was tired. With a grunt, the blond pushed himself up and off the bed.

He gathered his things for a shower and headed into the bathroom. On his way, he noticed that the door leading to Tsunade and Jiraiya's room was still open. They hadn't come home yet. Naruto winced, whenever they did, Tsunade was going to be a grumpy mess.

Looking down at the phone in his hand, the blond tapped on his Pandora app. He changed the station and put it on blast before placing it on the counter and closing the door behind him with his foot. He quickly rid himself of his clothes, he'd fallen asleep without changing it seemed, and jumped into the hot spray.

Naruto closed his eyes and leaned his head against the shower wall, letting the water run down his head.

He had to admit, his life was pretty good at the moment. Even with a creepy chemistry teacher stalking him. Even that could just be his imagination. The man did remind Naruto of him. His past. But it would be ridiculous to connect them just because they looked similar. Naruto just had to forget about it. He didn't want to remember.

Well. There was a few pieces of his past that he didn't hate. What he really wanted was to see Gaara.

Gaara, with his red hair, smoldering eyes, and intense kisses. As if on its own accord, Naruto's hand reached up to brush against his lips. Even after three years, he could still remember the feel, the taste...

God how he wanted it again. Wanted Gaara again.

A memory invaded his thoughts just them. They had gone to the park on a cloudy day. Neither of them had minded that the clouds had thrown water down to the earth. It had been a drizzle and they'd held hands, shared looks.

And the kisses, they had been magical that day. It had felt like they were the only two in the world. With Gaara, Naruto had felt loved. For the first time in his life. When he had been younger, he'd had it too, but that had been more friendship. With Gaara, it had been more, it had been everything.

With a shake of his head to dispel the tears, Naruto put some shampoo in his hand and lathered it into his blond hair. It was getting long, he'd have to get it cut soon. After the shampoo left his hair, Naruto turned off the water and got out. He toweled himself off, and put on his boxers and some black jeans.

Naruto picked up his phone and left the bathroom, leaving the door open. He made his way back to his room and sat down at his desk. Deciding to work some more on his book entry, Naruto took out his notebook from his backpack while his laptop booted up. After typing in his password and opening his document, Naruto got to work.

"If I can finish by the end of the week, I can send in it on Monday..." Naruto mumbled, leaning back against his chair briefly as he skimmed through the few sentences he'd written.

He reached onto his desk drawer and pulled out his glasses case. Naruto took them out and placed the black frames on. The semi fuzzy words cleared, and once again, the blond got to work.

Hours passed by with Naruto looking between the papers and his screen. The time didn't register to him until his alarm clock set off, knocking him out of his obliviousness of everything but his story. Swiftly, Naruto yanked off his glasses and blinked at the alarm.

With a start, Naruto finally registered the time flashing at him. "Damn!" He cussed, jumping away from the desk. At least he was done with five more chapters, three to go and the epilogue left.

As quickly as he could, Naruto shoved all his things into his backpack, before going around looking for his socks and shoes. Once he had those on, Naruto ran from his room, picking up a shirt on his way out and hurtled out of the house like his feet were on fire.

By the time Naruto made it to school, his shirt was on and he was out of breath. Maybe he should have taken the truck that once but he'd forgotten about it. "Stupid memory!" Naruto grumbled to himself as he made his way down the crowded halls and into his Algebra class. He made it just before the bell sounded. Naruto headed to his at the back. Shikamaru and Sasuke were already there. It seemed like he was the only one that was still standing up.

As soon as his butt hit the seat, the door opened and in walked Iruka-sensei. Naruto blinked for a second, usually Iruka was in the classroom before anyone else and hardly left it during that time. "Please do the problems on the board. I will be leaving the room for a few moments and when I come back, I expect them to be done." With that, he walked out the door leaving behind a few bewildered faces.

Naruto took out his a few sheets of paper and copied the problems onto it.

"Hey, Naruto." Someone said, making him glance up from the problems that he semi understood. Or at least he thought he did.

"Yeah?" Naruto looked up and noticed that it had been Shikamaru.

"Need help?"

Naruto grinned. "Sure!"

OoOoOoOoOoOoOoOoOoOoOoOoOo

"Naruto." Sai acknowledged as he sat down next to the blond at the table with the group they'd been introduced to the day before.

Naruto looked up from his notebook and smiled at him. "Hey."

"Here is my sketchbook." Sai held it out to Naruto who took it and eagerly turned the page to take a look.

"Wow, these are amazing Sai!" Naruto exclaimed as he looked through to the last half of the book.

"Thank you." Sai gave Naruto a small smile.

"Aren't you going to eat?" Shikamaru asked as he set his tray on Naruto's other side. Sasuke sat on the free seat next to him. No one else had gotten to the table yet.

Naruto glanced up at the line before shaking his head with a chuckle. "Nah. I forgot my wallet this morning. I woke up early and yet I was still almost late to class."

"Why did you get up early?" Sai commented as he watched Naruto flip through his sketchbook again.

"I didn't do it on purpose. Some idiot keeps calling me. The ringing woke me up and I couldn't fall asleep again." Naruto grumbled. "I can't even call the number back either."

"That doesn't explain why you were almost late to class, dobe." Sasuke spoke up with a smirk as Naruto sputtered indignantly at that.

"Don't call me that! Teme!" Naruto crossed his arms across his chest, and almost pouted. Almost.

Sai glanced from Naruto to Sasuke before turning back to the blond. "He's right."

"Ugh, fine! It's because I was writing and the time sort of...slipped my mind?" Naruto humphed before smiling. "And I'm almost done too!"

"Done with what?" Shikamaru asked after he'd swallowed his bite of rice cake.

Naruto sat up straight with a slight flush creeping up his neck. "Ah, well... You see... I'm entering a short story contest thing... and I finished more than half of it already...and yeah... that's what I was doing..."

"That's pretty cool. Is that why you're always writing in your laptop and notebook?" Shikamaru asked.

"Not really... I write fanfictions too..."

"Ah."

Sai was the next one to speak up. "What kind of fanfictions?"

Naruto contemplated that for a moment. He knew that all three had gotten the hint that he was gay... so if they didn't show any negative reactions to that then they probably wouldn't with his writing. Maybe. Eh."Well... It depends but I usually write yaoi."

"Yaoi?!" An excited voice startled all four teenage boys. They turned around as se Hinata and Tenten right behind them. "You write yaoi?!"

The two pushed Sai and Shikamaru out of the way. Sasuke managed to scoot away before Shikamaru could fall on him. Sai almost flew out of his chair with the for that Tenten had elbowed him out of the way.

Naruto looked from one to the other a bit bewildered and wondering if he should even answer the question. "...yes?"

"You've got to let us read them!" Tenten pleaded with stars in her eyes.

Hinata was nodding agreement. "W-we love ya-yaoi."

"Well... I have a... lot posted online... if you want to read those...?" Naruto didn't know where to go, the two girls kept getting closer and closer and he was starting to feel a bit uncomfortable with the proximity.

"What is this 'yaoi' that you speak of?" Lee had walked to the table along with Neji. He too seemed a bit puzzled with that word.

Hinata and Tenten shared a look before bursting out in mad he had to admit, Hinata's giggling was a lot quieter then Tenten's.

Naruto got up from the table, handing over the sketchbook he still had to Sai. "I just remembered, I needed something from the library. I'll give you the website and my username I post my things on after school." With that, Naruto fled.

OoOoOoOoOoOoOoOoOoOoOoOoOo

The next few weeks came like a flash. Naruto finished typing his short story and turned it in. It had taken just a little bit over than three hundred pages and multiple trip to the store to buy ink cartridges but it had been worth it. He couldn't wait to see what the judges thought. He wasn't conceited enough to say he'd won, but Naruto was proud of his story and just wanted to see what would come of it.

Kiba had told him that the trip had changed again and that they would be going in a week instead of months. Naruto could hardly contain himself with that. Soon he would get to see one of his best friends. Plans were already forming on where they would go and what they would do. He wasn't sure when he would be able to meet Haku but if it wasn't soon, he would go when he graduated. A road trip sounded fun.

Sasuke and Shikamaru hung out with Naruto more and more during school. For the first time since Gaara, Naruto has friends in school. It had been awkward at first, mostly because Naruto hadn't really known what to do a few times, but he had gotten better.

Sai had also made it into his friend circle. He'd been the first one too. Every class they had together, they sat next to each other and talked. Even when there was silence, it was comfortable. Naruto had even had him over at his house every few days. Luckily, Tsunade had seemed to forget about her first meeting with Sai.

Even Shikamaru and Sasuke's group of friends had become slightly more than acquaintances to Naruto. He was sure that he would be comfortable calling them friends soon.

He wasn't exactly sure if Tenten and Hinata had explained the term yaoi to Lee and Neji but the first time he'd seen them after that incident, Lee had told him that writing about love was most youthful.

Neji had seemed as stoic as always, though Naruto had thought that he'd seen the paleness of his skin turn the slightest bit of pink. Though that could have been his imagination.

One thing that got on his nerves was that he was still getting the prank calls. No one had left any messages. More and more, the prank caller(Naruto was sure it was the same person) was calling early in the morning. Naruto hadn't had a decent night's sleep in weeks and it was starting to get to him.

"Did you hear? There's a new transfer student!"

Naruto heard someone exclaim to their group as he walked through the hallway on his way to his mandatory study session with Orochimaru. This was the part of the day that he hated the most. Even the prank calls didn't have nothing on that. Going to Orochimaru for study sessions was torture. Every look that Orochimaru gave him, sent shivers down Naruto's spine. They weren't the good kind either. So far nothing like that day had happened, but Naruto couldn't help but think that it would. He couldn't even tell anyone either because he hadn't even done anything. What would he say? 'Hi, I'm getting this creepy feeling from my chemistry teacher and I can't stand being in the same room with him'. Yeah, that was not going to work.

"Yes! We haven't had anyone new since that Uzumaki kid, right?"

Naruto flinched a little, hidding his face with his hoodie a bit more. The tone she'd said his name in... Obviously she'd heard about his family.

"Yeah, hopefully this one won't be like him. He's supposed to start tomorrow..."

Naruto opened the door to Orochimaru's room and let it slam shut behind him before he heard anything else.

Yes, he had friends, but people still thought badly of him. Even though he'd done nothing.

"Naru-chan, so nice to see you."

Naruto jumped in surprise, hood flying off his head. He hadn't expected Orochimaru to be standing so close to the door. "Uh, hello..." Naruto mumbled, heading to Orochimaru's desk. Before he could sit down though, he felt a hand skimming his side. The blonde froze, and again he felt the touch. Something else brushed against his neck, making Naruto flinch.

"Let's get started, shall we?" Orochimaru whispered into his ear before going to sit in his chair like nothing had happened.

Naruto couldn't sit down, his muscles were locked and his blue eyes wide in shock. He had just kissed him. Orochimaru had just kissed his neck...

Orochimaru raised an eyebrow, looking concerned, though Naruto could see a satisfied glint in his eyes. "Is something wrong?"

Naruto swallowed hard before taking a seat.

"You know, I looked through your file, Naru-chan. Your adopted mother is Tsunade, correct?" Orochimaru caught Naruto's eye and smiled. "We've been friends since childhood. Very good friends. Jiraiya too."

Naruto dropped his eyes and swallowed hard again.

Nothing else happened but every time that Orochimaru leaned closer, Naruto flinched away.

The bell rang and students drifted into the room while Naruto moved away from Orochimaru and back to his desk. During class, Orochimaru stayed close to Naruto. Nobody seemed to notice anything wrong though. The blond kept his eyes locked on his table top. Time passed agonizingly slowly for him.

When the bell rang, the classroom emptied quickly, and Naruto tried his best to put his things away. Sasuke and Shikamaru had just stepped out the door, they had been moved farther away from Naruto but closer to the exit.

"Have a good day Naru-chan." Naruto jumped away and adverted his gaze. He walked out of the room, ignoring the chuckle that followed him out of the door.

OoOoOoOoOoOoOoOoOoOoOoOo

"Yo, Naruto." Shikamaru walked next to Naruto as they left the school.

"What's up?" Naruto grinned weakly at the genius.

Shikamaru frowned as he looked at Naruto. "Are you alright?"

Naruto glanced away quickly before focusing on Shikamaru again. "Yeah, I'm fine. Just a little tired. What did you need?" The blond quickly changed the subject.

Shikamaru gave him a look but complied with the subject change. "We have openings for the basketball team. Coach wanted us to ask around to see if anyone wanted to join."

"Basketball?" Naruto bit his bottom lip. "I don't know..."

"Come on, it's not that bad."

Naruto sighed. "Fine, I'll try out. I'm not promising anything more than that though."

Shikamaru gave a nod before waving and walking away. "After school tomorrow at the gym."

Naruto waved that he'd heard and began walking home. He would usually go find Sai but he didn't feel like it.

"Hey brat!"

Naruto looked up and saw Tsunade waving at him from her SUV. He walked over and got into the car. "I didn't expect you here."

Tsunade grinned at Naruto. "I was here visiting an old pal and I thought I might as well take you home."

Naruto felt the his stomach drop. "Really? W-who?"

"His name is Orochimaru. Do you have him for any classes? We used to live on the same street when we were younger. We went to school together. It's good to see old friends. He hasn't changed one bit." Tsunade chuckled as she drove down the street not noticing the look on Naruto's face. "You know that Jiraiya and Orochimaru used to try to oneup each other? They were such kids."

Not a word left Naruto's lips, not that Tsunade noticed.

"Oh! He invited us over to dinner for next Friday, try to have a free schedule, alright?" Tsunade turned into their driveway and parked.

Naruto nodded, and jumped out of the car. "I'm not hungry, I'm going to finish up some homework."

"Oh, are you sure?"

"Yeah.."

Once in his room, Naruto shut his door and leaned against it. He slowly slid down, eyes staring sightlessly ahead.

"_Naru_-_chan_."

Even if he told them, they wouldn't believe him. Nobody would.

"_We_ _were_ _good_ _childhood_ _friends_. _He_ _hasn't_ _changed_."

"_He's_ _eccentric_ _but_ _he's_ _been_ _teaching_ _students_ _for_ _years_. _The_ _principal_ _loves_ _him_. _He_ _could_ be _working_ at a _government_ _facility_ _but_ _he_ _chose_ _the_ _Academy_."

He had asked around to his newfound friends but none of them had said anything bad about Orochimaru. It was only with Naruto... he could only hope that things didn't get worse.

His phone rang but the sound didn't register.

* * *

A/N: Thank you for the reviews, faves and follows! I really appreciate them!

Special thanks to the previous chapters reviewers: yumenohime-sama, Guest(1), Guest(2), and PurpleOmpski!

Guest (1): I'm glad you do! You'll have to wait and see! ;D. Yay!

Guest(2): I'm so glad you love it! I actually found one but if you have an account, let me know what your username is and if my current beta doesn't have time anymore, I'll let you know :D.


	5. Chapter 5

Sorry for the wait!

Beta: landartheconqueror

* * *

Chapter 5:

Past:

Blond hair, brighter than the sun, tanned, soft skin. Sky blue eyes gazed down at the dirt and grass in front of him. Tiny face set in sadness. He was a small child, smaller then he should be for his age but the clothes he wore tended to disguise that fact. They overwhelmed him, hiding how skinny he actually was from too little food. Not enough nourishment.

The boy trembled. He was trying so hard not to let the tears fall. So hard not to show any pain. And loneliness.

It was always like this. He would be sitting there, one of the last kids to be picked up. Always alone, always forgotten.

Alway... always ignored.

The people he was staying with... His foster parents... They constantly forgot about him. Forgot that they were responsible for him. That he was a four year old boy that needed love. Needed affection.

Constantly... constantly forgotten about.

Naruto sniffed, bringing his hand up to rub at his leaking eyes. He couldn't help but whisper the one word he always asked himself. "Why?" Naruto wrapped his arms around his legs and buried his face into his knees, shutting out the world around him.

"Naruto-kun!" The shock of someone yelling his name made the tears stop. He scrubbed his face, wiping all the tears away. "Let's go play before Nii-san comes to pick me up!" A black haired child exclaimed as he stopped right in front of the blond who was blinking owlishly up at him. The boy smiled down at him, reaching out his hand, palm open.

Naruto hesitated for a second, just a second. He looked into those warm eyes, and he took the other's outstretched hand. The blond child recognised the other from his kindergarten class. They'd only ever said hello to each other and that was about it. His name was Sasu- something. Naruto couldn't really remember the rest. The boy dragged him over to the playground, asking Naruto a million questions that the blond couldn't answer because the boy jumped to another question almost immediately.

For the first time in as long as Naruto could remember, he laughed.

Giggled.

Had fun.

He felt as light as a feather while running around and playing with Sasu-chan. The boy didn't seem to mind the name when Naruto had first said it so Naruto figured it was okay to use. They had been playing for a little under thirty minutes, but to Naruto it felt much longer. He found that he didn't want it to end.

As soon as he thought that, it ended.

"Nii-san!" Sasu-chan suddenly cried out with a childish giggle, waving at the boy that had appeared in the school yard. Naruto turned and hid behind the black haired boy as an older looking Sasu-chan walked over to them. "This is my new friend Naru-chan!" He turned to Naruto and said in a whisper so that his brother wouldn't hear. "Just call my nii-san Ita-chan, he looks like a girl anyway!"

Naruto peaked out from behind Sasu-chan as the other boy got closer to them. He seemed friendly enough, a smile present on his lips, but Naruto couldn't be too sure. He'd been deceived before. He hardly knew why he even trusted Sasu-chan on sight as it was.

"Otouto, it's time to go home, the driver's waiting." The boy, Ita-chan, said and turned to nod at Naruto. "It's nice to meet you, Naru-chan. I'll be calling you that since you want to call me Ita-chan like my dear otouto." The older boy teased the blond boy, playfully tousling his gold locks.

Naruto bowed his head slightly as he watched them walk away, hiding the blush on his face. The younger one reached out and took his brother's hand as he walked away after waving goodbye to Naruto.

His chest hurt as they got farther away. Once again, the loneliness settled in and the blond couldn't help but feel a little jealous.

He wanted that. Someone that loved him like family...

As soon as the two disappeared into the parking lot, Naruto turned away and made his way to the front steps. He would wait a little bit longer but he doubted that anyone would come for him. Since the day he'd been sent to the school just after being taken to his new home- His 'new' family- he had been forgotten about by them.

Naruto had believed the social worker, believed that this 'family' would love him and want him. Treat him like their child. Like he belonged...

That had been wrong. Completely and utterly wrong.

He'd been thrown into a room and promptly ignored for the rest of the day and night. The next morning, he'd been fed and then taken to the school to register. When they got back 'home', the same pattern from the day before occurred. He was forgotten about. The only time he was even looked at was when he had to go to school. The man would drop him off on his way to work.

Naruto had had to walk into the office by himself on that first day.

Terrified had been one way to describe the way he had felt. Terrified and lonely.

Luckily, he had remembered the way from the day before. The secretary had been expecting him. She had seemed more than a little shocked that he was alone but she hadn't asked anything more then if his name was Naruto Uzumaki.

After confirming it, she'd taken him to his class and introduced him to the teacher and that was that. He was way to scared to meet anyone's eyes. He didn't talk during class. Not on that day and not much on the days following it. Though he did watch everyone. He noticed how the children played and had fun. He didn't feel like he belonged with them. And he'd been alone.

Until just an hour before, when Sasu-chan had reached out.

One of the teachers almost stumbled over him at that moment, breaking Naruto out of his lonely thoughts.

OoOoOoOoOoOoOoOoOo

Naruto kept his head down as he waited for everyone to leave. It had been six months since he'd become friends with Sasu-chan and Ita-chan. They had had fun for the last few months of kindergarten and after not being able to see them for a few months because of summer break, Naruto had gotten a bit lonely. Luckily, they had both gone to the same school again but that year, first grade, he hadn't been lucky enough to be in the same class as his dark haired friend. They still ended up playing together during recess and after school when his brother was late in picking him up but it wasn't the same for the blond.

That day he hadn't seen Sasu-chan during lunch so he assumed that his friend hadn't gone to school.

Naruto waited until the school yard was empty before picking up his bag and sneaking away. The teachers would think that he had been picked up already. A few weeks back, Naruto had gotten tired of waiting and had just... walked home. It wasn't that far of a walk (that's what he had told himself) and it was faster than waiting for a teacher to notice that he was still there. They would call his foster parents to come pick him up and he'd have to wait another two hours. Then the teacher would get a call to say that they hadn't been able to get out of work and if they could please drop Naruto off at home.

It was easier and the teachers had stopped being suspicious of his foster parents. Naruto knew that if they had continued to forget about him, his case worker would come to see if he was okay. He would see how badly it was. And before he could blink, they would take him away and he would never see Sasu-chan or Ita-chan ever again.

Naruto knew this because it had happened with the family before his current one at the beginning of kindergarten. He didn't want to leave again, not when he'd finally found two friends. Two people that cared. And if he had to walk home by himself to make sure he would stay, then he would do it.

Halfway home, he heard his name being called. The voice was familiar. It was Sasu-chan.

Naruto had forced himself to keep walking, to not look back. He didn't want his friends to know he walked home. They would tell a grown up and he would be sent away. They couldn't know.

He ran.

The next day, Naruto pretended to not know what Sasu-chan was talking about when he'd asked if the blond had walked home.

"My parents picked me up." Naruto blinked innocently at his friend after school as they waited for Ita-chan, neither feeling like running around the playground.

Sasu-chan didn't seem to believe him but Naruto didn't back down. He didn't want to lose them, and he was going to make sure he wouldn't.

"Otouto! Naru-chan!" Both turned when they heard their names. It was Ita-chan walking over to them.

As soon as he was in front of them, he leaned down with a smile on his face. Naruto noticed that he was watching him more than his brother. "Would you like to come to my taijutsu class? We'll drop you off at home, and you can use my cell phone to call your parents to make sure it's alright with them."

Naruto nodded his head before he could even think. The older boy led the two younger ones to the black car, handing Naruto the phone after they climbed in.

The blond stared at the phone for a few seconds, noticing that the brothers were watching him out of the corner of their eyes. Naruto took a slow breath before taking out the paper with the house number. He dialed the number with trembling fingers. After a couple of rings, it went straight to voicemail. Inwardly, Naruto relaxed. He left a short message. "I'll be going to a class after school, and I'll be home a little later than usual." The blond ignored the look Ita-chan was giving him as he handed the phone back. It was almost like he knew something. Naruto hoped he didn't.

That was when he met _him_.

"Sensei, this is my otouto's, as well as my friend, Naru-chan." Ita-chan introduced

"Ah, Naru-chan. It's a pleasure to meet you. I've been told so much about you." Golden eyes stared down at the blond boy.

Naruto smiled brightly up at the dark haired man.

From that day forward, Naruto went with them to the taijutsu class whenever it was Ita-chan's turn to pick Sasu-chan up.

Present:

The shrill sound of a phone ringing cut through Naruto's dreams. He hadn't been able to fall asleep very well that night and had just barely managed it a few hours before.

Groggily, Naruto reached out blindly for his phone. He managed to knock over a few of the things on his nightstand before his fingertips touched the vibrating object. Naruto fumbled with it before clicking on what he thought was the answer icon and brought the phone up to his ear. "H-hello?"

There was only silence. Naruto looked at the screen to make sure he had answered it in time. He had. With a frown, Naruto placed the phone to his ear again. "Hello? Is anyone there?"

His phone made a noise that told Naruto the call had been ended. He looked at the screened again before taking note of the time on the top right corner.

"Shit!" He would have to take the truck if he didn't want to be late.

As quickly as humanly possible; Naruto got ready, gathered his school things, found the keys, and finally, dashed out the door. He didn't remember to brush his teeth until he was already halfway down the read. With a grimace, Naruto popped a piece of gum into his mouth. Luckily, no one ever got close enough to possibly smell his bad breath.

Naruto ran into the classroom, clothes askew, and backpack open with his books barely hanging on. He would be surprised if he hadn't lost a few on his mad dash through the halls.

"Naruto, next time don't be late! I'll let it slide this once. Take a seat." His teacher admonished as Naruto bowed apologetically and stumbled to his seat. During the next hour, Naruto didn't even hear the words that came out of his sensei's mouth. He just felt tired and wanted to pass out.

When class ended, Naruto hurried to P.E.. He didn't notice Sasuke and Shikamaru trying to call him. The blond just plowed through the crowd and into the guy's changing room.

That was when he noticed that he forgot his gym clothes. "Damn it!"

"Are you alright?" The voice right next to him made Naruto jump. He hadn't notice Sasuke and Shikamaru walk up to him.

Naruto grimaced slightly, before smiling. He hoped they hadn't noticed his slip up. "I'm fine, just didn't get much sleep last night." He ran his hand through his hair, sighing heavily.

The two looked like they didn't believe him but didn't push as they began to change into their gym clothes. Naruto took the time to zip up his backpack properly before swinging it back onto his shoulder.

"You're not going to dress out?" Sai had just walked in and noticed Naruto's actions.

The blond shook his head before opening his mouth. "I forgot my gym clothes at home."

Naruto left and as soon as he spotted Gai-sensei he stopped to explain his predicament. The green clad man nodded his head, pointing to the bleachers.

"I'll let it pass this one time Naruto, but the next time you don't dress out, your grade will be lowered." The man gave Naruto a thumbs up after the blond had nodded his understanding. With that, Naruto walked away and sprawled onto the bleachers. He shifted a little until he was comfortable. After a moment, he pulled his hoodie up and over half of his face and closed his eyes.

The day was already shoddy and he wondered why he'd even gotten out of bed that day. Since Naruto had started at the Academy, he hadn't missed. Tsunade wouldn't have minded that much if he'd skipped one day. At least, she'd get over it since it wasn't like he ditched school. Never in fact.

Next time he felt like shit he wouldn't even open his eyes, Naruto promised himself. Pressing the palms of his hands onto his eyes, and pushing slightly didn't really help with his head ache. Though it did make burst of color explode behind his eyelids. Naruto stayed like that for a few minutes before grunting and reaching blindly for his backpack. After searching through it, the blond found a bottle of extra strength pain medicine. He popped four tablets into his mouth and dry swallowed them. They would probably take a while to work, he should have taken them during his first period but he'd forgotten that he'd had the pills there until that moment.

Suddenly, he remembered how he'd been woken up that morning. Naruto opened his eyes, and with a grunt, he reached into the pockets on his jeans. Naruto pulled out his phone. The blond was incredibly lucky that he hadn't forgotten it at home since he'd left in a hurry.

He scanned the call log and saw that the latest call was from a blocked number. "What the fuck is it with people and private numbers?" Naruto couldn't help but grumble to himself as he scrolled through the rest of his call log. The blond frowned as he noticed a pattern with the calls from blocked numbers. They had started on that day when Tsunade had essentially kidnapped Sai, Shikamaru, and Sasuke. He'd gotten one phone call from a blocked number every day since then. At first it was only in the late afternoon. Then they had gotten earlier and earlier with every single call, and multiple times a day as well. Most of them he missed because his phone was on silent during class. "Is it all from one person?" Naruto muttered with a raised eyebrow. After contemplating that for a moment, Naruto shook his head. If it continued though, he would ask Tsunade if he could change his number to stop the annoying calls.

Just then, the email icon popped onto the upper left hand corner of his phone. Naruto opened it and noticed it was a P.M. from .

* * *

From: Fanfiction

To: Me

You have received a message from:

TheYaoiLover

Subject: Hi

Hey, I was just wondering if you were alright? You haven't been updating any of your stories recently and you usually do a few every week. I was just checking up to make sure you were alright.

Hope to hear from you soon!

-TYL

* * *

With a start, Naruto noticed that it was true. He hadn't updated anything for a few weeks. The only thing he'd even worked on was the story for the short story contest and that had been it. He'd finished it and hadn't written anything else that was related to his hobby. Guilt went through him then. Naruto was pretty sure that he'd promised more than a few updates to several followers. He hadn't even noticed till that moment either.

Naruto didn't even have a legitimate excuse either! He'd just been feeling a lot more down(creeped out), and just hadn't... written.

The blond sighed. He then clicked on the reply link and began typing.

* * *

Hey TYL! I'm sorry I haven't been updating. Just got a little distracted and couldn't seem to write. I'm fine and thank you for checking with me, 'm sorry I had you worried! I'll try to update things soon!

-Kyuubi

* * *

Pretty soon after that, Naruto noticed that Gai-sensei was introducing someone to the class. He couldn't tell how the new student looked because, like Naruto, he had a hoodie over his head. Since he was too far away, Naruto didn't hear the kids name either. Naruto shrugged and leaned back again. He'd find out later, it wasn't like it was important.

This time he just stared up at the ceiling. From out of the corner of his eye, Naruto saw the new guy head over towards him. He stopped a few yards away from Naruto and sat down, taking a similar position to Naruto's. He didn't show any signs that he wanted to talk. Since the blond didn't feel like socializing at the moment, he ignored him and went back to staring up at the ceiling.

"Naruto!"

Naruto jerked up in surprise, almost hitting his face against Shikamaru's. The brunette had been leaning over him, trying to get him to wake up.

"What?! Kami, what the fuck was that for?!" Naruto groaned, rubbing his face. The action made the hoodie fall down. He hadn't even noticed that he'd fallen asleep in the middle of class.

"I called you a few times, you wouldn't wake up. Is everything alright?" Shikamaru asked and Naruto noticed that other than his new friends and the new kid that seemed to have frozen halfway to the door, they were alone. "Really? Sorry, I didn't get much sleep last night... must have passed out. When I'm in a deep sleep, it usually takes a bit for me to snap out of it." Naruto forced a grin on his face. Shikamaru didn't seem to buy it, but Naruto pushed himself up and grabbed his bag. "Right, lunch time! Let's hurry, I'm starving!"

The blond walked towards the doors, the three S's right beside him. When they got to the locker room, the three changed quickly while Naruto waited patiently, and then all four went to lunch. They walked through the doors into the bustling cafeteria when he heard it.

"Naruto?"

Naruto almost tripped as he spun around to look behind him. That voice was so similar. The new kid was standing just behind them. The blond's eyes widened when the other's brown and cream colored hood was pulled away from his face. The bright red hair, the tattoo that was kanji for 'love' on his forehead, the sea foam green eyes that pierced straight through Naruto's heart... it was achingly all familiar.

_Gaara_...

It was him... It really was him!

Naruto got closer and raised his trembling hand and gently trailed down Gaara's face. "Gaara..." Naruto whispered, eyes trailing down Gaara's face before locking on his eyes. Those amazing eyes...

Suddenly, arms were around him, pulling Naruto flush against the other's body. The feel of those arms were familiar, oh-so familiar. They held onto him tightly, he wouldn't be able to break away from the hold, even if he had wanted to. Cerulean eyes looked slightly up at the taller teen. Vaguely, Naruto remembered that they used to be the same height.

"It really is you... I've missed you..." Gaara whispered, eyes softening slightly before his head descended and captured Naruto's lips in a kiss that the blond gladly welcomed with a soft groan. He completely forgot that they weren't alone.

The once noisy room now shocked into silence.

:**Flashback**:

Naruto hunched lower, almost trying to hide in his hoodie. He was the new kid. Again, he was the new kid. When was that going to stop? When was he going to find his forever home?

"Probably never." Naruto whispered to himself as he looked at the numbers next to the classroom doors. Finally spotting his destination, Naruto took a deep breath and pushed the door open.

"What can I- Are you our new transfer student?" The sensei asked.

Naruto nodded his head slightly, not speaking just yet. Students seemed excited about him. That probably wouldn't last long. It never did.

"What's your name?" The teacher continued, oblivious to Naruto's dread.

"Naruto Uzumaki..." The blond said, hunching as everyone recoiled as he said his last name.

The sensei nodded slightly and pointed to a chair at the back that was empty. "Go ahead and sit over in that empty seat. And here's your book for this class. Make sure you don't lose it."

Taking the book that was held out to him, Naruto quickly moved to his seat, ignoring the way people shifted away from him. That's how it always was when he transferred to new schools. Students would flinch away from him and then when they noticed that he stayed to himself, the bolder ones would pick fights. It was a cycle that always happened, without fail.

Naruto slipped into the seat, already bracing himself for a horrible first day.

Then something caught his eye.

Well, someone.

Green eyes. Red hair. A tattoo on his forehead...

And he was looking at Naruto.

It wasn't a bad look either. It was something else... Naruto could feel himself turn red as their gazes caught and held each others.

Maybe that day wouldn't be so horrible after all.

:**End** **Of Fl****ashback**:

Gaara pulled away from the kiss and looked tenderly down at Naruto, arms tightening a fraction more. "I've missed you so much Naruto... I'm sorry..."

Naruto blushed slightly before frowning at the apology. "You don't need to apologize Gaara. You didn't do anything wrong."

"No, I do. I promised never to leave you, and I didn't keep my promise." Gaara whispered, eyes showing the conflict that was going through him.

Someone coughed behind them.

"So.. You two know each other, obviously..." Sasuke stated, looking the redhead over.

"Is Gaara the one you got your tattoo with and for?" Sai asked looking interested.

"You have a tattoo?!" Both Shikamaru and Sasuke asked more than a little shocked.

Gaara's eyes narrowed slightly, looking up to glare at Sai. "He's seen your _tattoo_?"

* * *

A/N: It's Gaara! Kudos to the ones that guessed it was him that was the new student! Sorry if it's more past then actual present time but I wanted to show more about his past and how Naruto met people that he doesn't know are currently in his life(except for Gaara).

I split this chapter, otherwise it would have taken me longer to finish it, so I hope you enjoyed! I'll try to start the next in a few days so you won't have to wait long but I can't promise anything.

Thank you for the readers, followers, favoriters, and reviewers!

Special thanks to: tiki, yumenohime-sama, RvsB, PurpleOmpski, and TigrezzTail: for reviewing Chapter 4!

TigrezzTail: Naruto's memories are from when he was around five so they are fuzzy. He also tried to forget about it so things aren't clear whenever he gets nightmares. That's why he can't really remember Sasuke and Itachi's faces either.


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